This morning @WSJ has an inspiring story about how Sharpie is moving production from China to US by investing in automation and upskilling employees.
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@bscholl @WSJ That company is not doing well at all. Newell Brands (owner of Sharpie) is a bankruptcy candidate long term. $5b in debt (only $200m in cash), refinanced around a billion of it from low 4.2% rate now at 8.5% rate! Sales are down 5% y/y. Despite having 15 US plants they will
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@PaulYacoubian @bscholl @WSJ I’m confused Paul, are you saying they should keep building in China? Not celebrate the onshoring of manufacturing? Or just that the company is a going concern?
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@BrennanWoodruff @PaulYacoubian @bscholl @WSJ I guess he’s pointing that they probably got some subsidies or gov baked loans to extend their life-line … coupled to reshoring. Anything else doesn’t make sense. So, while it seems cool and awesome - if it’s build upon a failed economic structure and missing stability and
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@Berniverse42 @PaulYacoubian @bscholl @WSJ Totally fair, and I give Paul the benefit of the doubt that he was well intentioned here (Paul is great person), but the way he said it falls short of making that point.
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@BrennanWoodruff @Berniverse42 @bscholl @WSJ Haha thanks guys, I was just sharing what I knew about Newell. Dug deeper on the sharpie topic. They’ve been making them in Maryville TN for over a decade, so this is just a nice PR thing probably (par for the course these days). Maryville is a suburb of Knoxville, its where
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@PaulYacoubian @BrennanWoodruff @bscholl @WSJ Probably fair to assume that received some loans or subsidies in the region?
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@Berniverse42 @BrennanWoodruff @bscholl @WSJ Couldn’t find any. Looks like every time their Mexicali plant caught fire (ink is alcohol based, so flammable) they just moved more production lines to the TN plant. They now have a 70k sf ink plant set up in Manchester, TN (home of Bonnaroo music festival, < 2hrs from
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@PaulYacoubian @BrennanWoodruff @Berniverse42 @bscholl @WSJ "That means theres a lot of manufacturing and process engineering talent and other companies based within a 5mi radius. Good spot to set up manufacturing ops." Doesn't it mean US also has good manufacture potential .
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