Ten years ago, Bloomington-Normal wasn't known for manufacturing.
Mike O'Grady was vice president of the Bloomington-Normal Economic Development Council [EDC] at the time. He was part of a delegation that flew to California hoping to convince Mitsubishi Motors to keep its car factory in Normal open.
That effort failed. O'Grady said that was a wake-up call.
“It looks like we’ve got an awful lot of eggs in one basket,” O’Grady recalled then-EDC President Kyle Ham saying at the time. “We have heavy banking, [are] heavy in education, heavy in medical. Where is the manufacturing?”
As for the industries that had carried the Twin Cities, State Farm was expanding out of state and colleges were bracing for an enrollment cliff.
The lack of business diversity was a vulnerability. When a startup automaker offered to buy the massive and outdated car plant to build electric vehicles, O'Grady said community leaders decided they had to do everything to make it work.
“Is it worth us taking a chance? Auto manufacturing, that’s tough. It was kind of a scary decision to move forward, but we did,” said O’Grady, who now does economic development for the Wabash Valley Power Alliance.
It did work.
Rivian far exceeded even its own expectations and became one of the area's largest employers. Rivian isn't the only success story that helped revitalize Bloomington-Normal manufacturing. An ag implement maker from Canada, Brandt Industries, opened its first U.S. facility when it bought a plant north of Normal in 2018. That same year, candymaker Ferrero bought the former Nestle plant in south Bloomington. The site now houses the company's only North American chocolate factory.
Bloomington-Normal's manufacturing workforce has nearly tripled in the last five years, from. Total wages have increased five-fold.
Patrick Hoban, president and CEO of the Bloomington-Normal Economic Development Council, has seen a lot of that growth. Hoban grew up in Decatur, a city built on manufacturing — think ADM and, for a long time, Bridgestone Firestone. He knew the economic ripple manufacturing jobs create.
“We know how big the multiplier is. The standard across the nation is about 3 to 1. So if you add a manufacturing job, that usually supports three other jobs, whether that is direct from a supplier or induced from any of the restaurants or retailers that support them,” he said.
Hoban said Bloomington-Normal has geographic advantages. It's centrally located in the U.S. and in Illinois. It has three interstates. And it has an abundance of available workers. More than 1 million people live close enough to Bloomington-Normal to commute to work.
“If you shift that laborshed around between Champaign or Peoria, us being in the middle, we get their laborshed,” Hoban said. “So our laborshed is stronger than all of their’s because if you go to Champaign, you start losing Peoria.”
Hoban said the area also has an abundant supply of energy. That's important to manufacturers as they automate more operations.
Part of McLean County's success story in manufacturing also comes from predictable tax incentives, said Hoban: Developers know going in what's available to them.
Hoban got Bloomington, Normal, McLean County, Gibson City and Ford County to agree to standard incentives. They had previously resisted.
“I was actually told when I got here that it would be a pretty heavy lift to get that pulled off between all entities to agree,” he said.
Rivian, Ferrero and others later used those incentives to grow. Hoban said a standardized package gave employers certainty and far less time in negotiations.
“Our role in economic development is to create an environment where if a business or a citizen wants to invest, in order to do that you have to eliminate risk and uncertainty,” he said. “If we don’t have that in the surrounding communities or the surrounding states do, at the end of the day it comes down to a spreadsheet."
Cooperation
The agreement on standardized incentives is an example of cooperation that's key to economic development. It doesn't always happen.
“It's interesting, you would think they would all get along, but unfortunately in every community, they don’t,” said Mark Denzler, president and CEO of the Illinois Manufacturers Association.
“Sometimes, you have elected officials that have their own agendas and don’t necessarily get along with the chamber or an economic development corporation or there’s battles between chambers and EDCs and a battle between a city and a county," he said.
Denzler said he sees the cooperation at the state level, too. While the association has pushed the state to lower the tax burden for businesses, he said the state does play an active role in business attraction and retention. That includes site selection and incentives.
“We’ve certainly had our challenges in the state from a budget standpoint from property taxes and workers compensation, but really over the last six or seven years we’ve done a great job or improving the state’s perception and reputation but it takes a long time to overcome,” Denzler said.
Another example of that cooperation happens among manufacturers themselves. The McLean County Chamber of Commerce has a new manufacturing working group.
“It really was this boom of, ‘Oh my gosh, we’ve got an expanding industry in manufacturing. What are we doing to provide them the resources they need to be successful here?'" said chamber president and CEO Charlie Moore.
Employers meet regularly to discuss ways they can grow. Moore said the conversation often comes back to where to find workers.
“That’s the topic of conversation that comes up in every meeting, whether or not there is added jobs, whether there is a change in jobs, whether there is an addition to a line, whatever it might be, and where do they find the talent,” he said.
Workforce development
One place they find future workers is Heartland Community College.
David Vazquez is a mechanical and electrical apprentice at the Bridgestone tire plant in Normal. He's taking an electrical maintenance class at Heartland.
He demonstrates how he uses a multimeter, a handheld device with cords that plug into a simulated but live electrical box to test how much voltage its generating. He then converts the circuit to lower power as an electrician would for energy that's going into a home.
Vazquez said he was turning wrenches when he was a kid, but this work is higher tech than that.
“You definitely have to have a critical thinking aspect when it comes to maintenance or anything [related to] problem solving,” Vazquez said. “You have to weight they way you think, the way things move, the way machines function with each other.”
Vazquez is from Los Angeles and spent six years in the Navy. At age 36, Vazquez is a non-traditional student. The class also has traditional students.
Danica White from Kankakee said she's been drawn toward mechanics since she learned to work with her hands growing up on the farm.
“I think of it as adult Legos. You can build stuff, make stuff work. I like doing that personally,” White said.
White hopes to use her skills to run electricity in homes. White says she learned about Heartland's advanced manufacturing program through her high school guidance counselor.
Mike Deavers teaches industrial technology at Heartland's Advanced Manufacturing Center. He's watched the program grow significantly in just a few years.
“I honestly, this year, have twice as many students as I’ve ever had and we are continuing to grow,” Deavers said.
Heartland expects even more growth with the coming addition of a smart factory, an assembly line that has robotics and other training simulations.
Heartland now offers dozens of short-term certificate programs that students can put toward a two-year applied science degree.
Adam Campbell, Heartland's dean of the Career and Technical Education division, said Heartland uses its classroom workspace to combat the perception of manufacturing work as dark, dirty and dangerous.
“Overcoming that stereotype has been a priority goal for what we do here at Heartland, making sure that students understand that it’s not just coming in and pushing a button and making a widget,” Campbell said. “It’s actually hands-on very skilled trade."
Campbell said preparing workers for jobs also includes lessons in soft skills.
“Individuals coming to these companies, they need – and we hear it from these employers all the time – they need to be able to show up to work. They need to be on time, they need to be able to work as part of a team,” Campbell said.
Heartland gets some of its work-ready students from the Bloomington Career Academy, which accepts high school students from across McLean County.
Uncertain future
Heartland Community College and the Bloomington Career Academy are developing the manufacturing workers of the future, but it's an uncertain future.
Bloomington-Normal's tried-and-true industries — insurance, education, agriculture, healthcare — are generally considered recession-proof. Manufacturing not so much. The community also is in the midst of a housing shortage.
The EDC's Patrick Hoban said that is making it increasingly difficult to find workers.
“We need to have an affordable community. We’ve got all these great college kids. We’ve got an awesome [College] of Engineering coming along at Illinois State University,” Hoban said. “My question is how do we retain that talent if they can’t afford to live here right now?”
And the government spirit of cooperation that has helped manufacturers grow could be fracturing. Bloomington, Normal and McLean County are publicly fighting over shared sales tax money tied to mental health and new technology.
Mark Denzler from the Illinois Manufacturers Association said he hopes that gets resolved soon for the betterment of all.
