By Dennis Quick

Native neglect. It’s exciting when a big company comes to town. The promise of several hundred well-paying jobs is an economic developer’s dream.

Big Co. puts our region on the global radar screen, helping us attract other big companies and slews of smaller ones to boot. Politicians, other government officials and business leaders herald Big Co.’s arrival as a boon to the community and a boost to Big Co. Everybody wins, we’re told.

However, if our existing companies, particularly small businesses, are given few opportunities to do business with Big Co., everyone does not win.

Lots of Lowcountry companies would love to get a foot inside the forthcoming Vought-Alenia manufacturing center. That could be difficult because Vought has yet to embrace local businesses. Yes, they’ve occasionally passed out contact information to local companies interested in doing business with them. But that’s a limp handshake, not a community-caring bear hug.

A bear hug would be a “Get to Know Vought Day” in which Vought’s contract procurers meet with local companies—the coliseum would be a good location for this—and discuss the kind of contracts they need to fill and how local companies can compete for them.

Such a get-together is a pipe dream. That’s because Vought has already awarded its major contracts, those pertaining to the production of the 787 Dreamliner passenger jet fuselages. I wouldn’t be surprised if those contracts were awarded well before Vought even decided to come here. (I’ll venture to say that location probably was the last thing Vought decided.)

Local companies can compete for the leftover, non-production contracts by getting in line on Vought’s database. The line is long—more than 200 companies are in it—and the opportunities for contracts relatively few.

If that’s not enough of a rub, some local companies are afraid they’ll lose employees to the new Vought facility. That’s a legitimate fear. With Vought offering salaries roughly 40% higher than the Charleston County average, you can bet local workers will be filling out Vought job applications.

So where does this leave us? We can, and should, feel good about landing a big company that will help increase our per capita wealth and perhaps spark the growth of an aerospace cluster. However, if we neglect our existing companies while we shower the big newcomer with sweet deals, if our present companies lose growth opportunities because they can’t nab lucrative contracts with the big company and if they risk going under because of an employee drain, our net economic gain could be negated.

The next time we pursue a corporate giant, let’s extend some love to our existing companies, especially the small ones—the ones who employ most of us. We can extend this love by requiring the behemoth we’re wooing to make a vigorous effort to give our existing businesses shots at major contracts. In fact, let’s go a step further and say the company we’re after must award some of its contracts to local businesses.

If corporate executives say they look forward to being a part of and working with our community, this is a way to make them prove it.

But again, I’m dreaming. I doubt states as economically hungry as ours are in any position to make demands. Besides, in an age when so many big corporations are “global” and feel no allegiance to community or country, tossing such a proviso into the deal probably would compel Big Co. to get up from the table and look elsewhere.

Land lover. On Feb. 25, Noisette President and CEO John Knott was awarded the State Environmental Awareness Award. He won the award for his efforts to help protect, preserve and improve South Carolina’s natural resources.

He deserves it. Few people (and even fewer business leaders) promote environmentally safe, healthful and economical building practices as strongly as John Knott, the mastermind behind the 3,000-acre Noisette urban redevelopment project.

His goal of transforming North Charleston into the “New American City,” a place that is entirely sustainable, with clean air and water, building materials that lower energy bills and keep you healthy and comfortable, a city design that works with rather than against the environment and is conducive to walking, jogging and bicycle riding is refreshingly radical.

It’s not every day you meet a visionary, and that’s what Knott is. He might be from Baltimore, but Noisette proves Knott’s heart is in the Lowcountry.

Dennis Quick is senior staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail him at dquick@crbj.com.

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