It can be difficult to recruit manufacturing jobs when labor costs in countries like China are a fraction of what they are in the U.S., Bob Crouch, CEO of Adecco Group North America, told a JAXUSA Partnership luncheon Monday.
However, officials of the economic development arm of the JAX Chamber are hoping a Chinese company will bring a manufacturing plant to Jacksonville next year.
JAXUSA Chair Fredrik Eliasson told the attending members that officials are working to bring the Chinese plant to Jacksonville in the first half of 2015.
Eliasson, who also is executive vice president and chief financial officer of CSX Corp., said after the meeting that he couldn’t give any more details about that company. “We’ve got to be tight-lipped about it,” he said.
JAXUSA President Jerry Mallot also couldn’t give many details, but said he is optimistic.
“We’ve got a great chance of being selected,” he said.
Mallot said it will not be a big plant, with maybe 25 to 50 jobs, but he said the head of the Chinese company also is considering moving his family to Jacksonville. Mallot also said that with so few Chinese manufacturers moving operations to the U.S., this could open doors for future business deals with Chinese companies.
“We think we’ll see more going forward,” he said.
During his keynote address at the luncheon at the Hyatt Regency Jacksonville Riverfront Hotel, Crouch posted data showing the average hourly cost for a U.S. manufacturing worker is about $35, while the cost in China is only about $2. That makes it difficult to grow manufacturing jobs in the U.S.
“Will we ever get that huge swing of manufacturing back? I don’t think so,” Crouch said.
However, Jacksonville is getting its share of international companies looking at the city for various operations.
Eliasson said Jacksonville has hosted representatives from the U.S., Germany, the Netherlands, Canada, France and Ireland this year.
Adecco is a good example of an international company that is creating jobs in Jacksonville. The Switzerland-based human resources consulting company came to Jacksonville in 2010 when it acquired MPS Group Inc.
After naming Crouch, a former MPS executive, as CEO of its North American group in 2012, Adecco this year decided to move its North American headquarters from Melville, N.Y., to Jacksonville.
During his talk, Crouch played a video message recorded by Patrick De Maeseneire, CEO of the entire Adecco Group, when he was in Jacksonville for organizational meetings last week.
“To be honest, I had never heard of Jacksonville before we started visiting with MPS executives five years ago,” De Maeseneire said.
However, he has been impressed with the city since Adecco bought MPS.
“The talent in Jacksonville is some of the best I’ve seen,” he said.
Crouch noted that De Maeseneire used the word “folks” in his message, demonstrating that Jacksonville is rubbing off on him.
“I guarantee you four years ago he had never heard that word,” Crouch said.
Although Jacksonville lost a corporate headquarters when Adecco acquired MPS, the deal has worked out well for Northeast Florida as Adecco has actually increased its employment in Jacksonville from 400 when the acquisition was completed to about 750 now, he said.
While it is growing locally, Adecco may not be well known in Jacksonville.
“The number one question I always get is who in the world is Adecco and whatever happened to Modis?” Crouch said.
Modis was an information technology staffing subsidiary of MPS and its name was posted atop the signature 35-story building on the Downtown Jacksonville skyline, which is now named for Wells Fargo Bank.
Modis still is operating as a subsidiary of Adecco and expects to have revenue of about $800 million this year, Crouch said.
“Modis is gone from the skyline but doing very well,” he said.
Adecco, which operates in 60 countries, has about $25 billion in total annual revenue, including nearly $5 billion in the U.S.
Adecco provides “the whole gamut” of staffing and placement services to small and large companies around the world, and is also working with major Jacksonville-based companies such as CSX and Stein Mart Inc.
“We want to dominate Jacksonville,” Crouch said.
Adecco’s long list of major clients also includes Wells Fargo, the company that replaced Modis on the Downtown tower.
“We don’t mind that you’ve got the building, as long as you stay a client,” Crouch said.
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