Texas CEO Magazine July|August 2014 | Page 4

publisher’s letter TEX S ceo magazine July|August 2014 Volume 5, Issue 4 Publisher Pat Niekamp Managing Editor Ray Niekamp Art Director Tania Roberts Sales Truby Chiaviello Potomac Media 202-363-3741 Photography Shannon Drawe Jonathan Garza Social Marketing Manager Will Pate READY FOR THE REVIVAL? Tony Gilbert called it right. Tony Gilbert is Vice President of Manufacturing and Engineering at Mary Kay Inc. and was part of our 2014 Economic Forecast event in Dallas last year where he talked about trends in manufacturing. With a plant in Dallas, one in China and in the EU, Tony saw first-hand how the rising cost of labor in China and the decreasing cost of energy in the U.S. was impacting his operations. Their Dallas operation was nearly even in costs with their China plant when you look at the cost of landed goods. After listening to Tony, our editors agreed it was time to devote a full issue to the topic of the revival of onshoring. In fact, Texas may be leading the manufacturing comeback. Houston was recently ranked at No. 1 and San Antonio at No.4 by Forbes for manufacturing jobs in the U.S. Here are some stats on jobs: • Texas - Total: 1,200,525 • Houston: 249,934 • Dallas/Fort Worth: 136,321 • San Antonio: 52,225 • Austin: 47,620 For those in the space, it’s probably no surprise to read research from the Pew Charitable Trust that skilled trades positions are the most difficult to fill by U.S. employers. As many as 600,000 manufacturing jobs were vacant in 2011 because employers couldn’t find the skilled workers to fill them, including machinists, distributors, technicians and industrial engineers. These jobs pay well at an average wage of $77,500. Read on. Pat Niekamp, Publisher [email protected] Writer & Editor Dacia Rivers Web Developer Jeff Rose Branding & Web Design Andrew Niekamp Contributors Brian Bedford Laurence Capron Albert Carrion Kevin Fincher, CPA John Koob Edward Latson Art Markman, Ph.D. Julie Miller Will Mitchell Lee Mulkey Neelima Phadnis, Ph.D. Mark Sessumes Tom Smith Mark L. Spearman, Ph.D. Joel Trammell To subscribe to Texas CEO, please visit our website: www.texasceomagazine. com and click subscribe. The contents of this publication are copyright 2014 by Texas CEO Media, LLC, with all rights restricted. Any reproduction or use of content without written consent of Texas CEO Media is strictly prohibited. Texas CEO reserves the right to edit all contributed articles. Editorial content does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the publisher. Any advice given in editorial content or advertisements should be considered informative only. Potomac Media is the sales representative for Texas CEO Magazine. Truby Chiaviello can be reached at 202-3633741 or [email protected]. POSTMASTER Please send address changes to Texas CEO Media, P.O. Box 92436, Austin, TX 78709 (512) 646-3478