CAMA must seize the moment and alter course to advance Colorado manufacturing

/in /by

You could argue that CAMA — the Colorado Advanced Manufacturing Association — was kneecapped before it got started.

The association was formed just before I launched CompanyWeek in 2013. I said this in an August, 2014 column, “Change at Colorado’s OEDIT an opportunity to upgrade Hick’s Blueprint”:

“OEDIT prioritized manufacturing by establishing CAMA — the Colorado Advanced Manufacturing Alliance — at a time when confidence in the Colorado Association for Manufacturing and Technology, then CAMT and now Manufacturer’s Edge, had waned. CAMA’s now an important advocate for regional manufacturing. Manufacturer’s Edge has also benefited, free from obligations of a trade association to operate true to its federal charter as a service provider to industry.”

I also thought the new association held promise to cut through the confusion around the Blueprint’s 14 Key Industries. “Advanced Manufacturing” — CAMA’s namesake — was labeled a Key Industry, even though it’s not an industry, and most Colorado manufacturers weren’t “advanced” at all, as much they aspired to be. For me, the upgrade to the Blueprint was that CAMA would build a true statewide, industry-wide, coalition of manufacturers — including low-tech producers in Colorado’s high-growth industries.

The model that made most sense to me was one in place across the U.S., then and now. CAMA would represent a cross-section of manufacturing interests as the state lobbyist for manufacturing, and from this clear mission grow and develop, much like CMTA in Sacramento, UMA in Salt Lake City, and TMA in Austin.

That didn’t happen. I’m sure that CAMA architects Ken Lund and Noel Ginsburg had good reason.

One explanation is that Chuck Berry, the influential CEO of the Colorado Chamber of Commerce, was already doing it. Berry had assembled a powerful but small group of manufacturers — blue chippers like Reynolds Aluminum and Ball Corporation — in a manufacturer’s council. Whatever the reason, the model prevailed.

In my opinion, it’s not the best approach. CACI lobbies for multiple industries and sectors, on issues important to business. They do great work. But the most effective way to strengthen Colorado manufacturing and compete on a national level is to have the industry trade association working the statehouse, in a coordinated manner, around issues important to manufacturing. More, CAMA and Colorado are at a disadvantage without the alignment.

Timing may be on CAMA’s side. Chuck Berry is retiring. CACI will have a new CEO.

CAMA and OEDIT must seize the moment and work with CACI’s new leadership to effect a change that benefits both entities.

The Polis administration can also leave its mark on Colorado manufacturing with a sector “blueprint” of its own. I’m rooting for the following:

  • Relaunch CAMA along with the clear and exclusive mission of lobbyist for Colorado manufacturing. Require more transparency and accountability.

  • Establish a new Advanced Industries grant program for consumer brands including the outdoor industry. This was articulated clearly by local manufacturers to leaders of the Colorado Outdoor Recreation Industry Office in a meeting I hosted in August. In a manufacturing ecosystem of small businesses, companies are desperate for new technology and need help in acquiring it. Rama Harris’ AI grant program is so important. It should be expanded.

  • Update the current blueprint: Colorado’s spectacular food and food manufacturing sector is a Key Industry, fully independent of Agriculture. Outdoor Recreation is more — it’s Outdoor Industry. And what of manufacturing’s Enabling Technologies?

  • Embrace the cannabis sector to create a new manufacturing workforce. I’ve heard manufacturing leaders say they don’t “support marijuana.” Wishing cannabis would go away isn’t a responsible policy position. Hundreds of Colorado young people are today cannabis manufacturing employees. Let’s keep these kids in manufacturing by providing alternative industry career paths, if they choose, that leverage their experience. Manufacturing is desperate for their services. Celebrating, not vilifying, their chosen industry, is a first step.

Other ideas? Send them to me. We’ll provide the platform to showcase a wave of modern thinking around the sector.

Bart Taylor is publisher of CompanyWeek. Reach him at btaylor@companyweek.com.


READ MORE on the topic from this author:

CAMA turns a corner

CAMA on SMART/FourFront: A Q&A with Tim Heaton and Karla Tartz

Colorado’s myriad trade groups compete to promote. A MFG partnership promises collaboration

Change at Colorado’s OEDIT an opportunity to upgrade Hick’s Blueprint

Stage is set for manufacturers to advance their interests

Time is now for a cohesive regional manufacturing strategy

Colorado is flunking manufacturing. Or is it?



Thinking big: CompanyWeek launches in Texas

/in /by

Eight years ago this fall, we launched CompanyWeek to report on Colorado’s over-performing manufacturing economy. Along the way, we added Utah and California editions of CompanyWeek Mfg. Reports.

Last week we opened a new chapter. With the launch of the TX Mfg. Report, we land in America’s most talked-about manufacturing ecosystem. A business-friendly reputation, access to labor, a rich R&D ecosystem, and a foundation of industrial acumen are combining to attract companies and entrepreneurs here. Texas assets are working like gravity to tug manufacturing companies into the state.

And people. I recently moved from Colorado to Texas.

Location matters, but then again, it doesn’t. The folks reimagining U.S. manufacturing share a bond that often transcends state lines.

Randy Bloomer thought he could build a better horse trailer. And did. Eric Wallace and his pals couldn’t stomach American beer. So he launched Left Hand Brewing and a craft beer revolution, along with others like Justin Gold, whose eponymous Justin’s Nut Butter helped change America’s staid food industry. Tony and Terry Pearce watched traditional mattress companies gouge consumers and launched Purple — from Utah.

Job shops operating in Tesla’s supply chain, like Hale Foote’s Scandic, are as transformational and agile as their OEM, as are Heather Bulk’s Special Aerospace Services and Pamela Kan’s Bishop-Wisecarver. Innovation is rampant. Entrepreneurial acumen is off the charts.

They’ve also all been featured in CompanyWeek. We write about manufacturers. And manufacturers are our readers. We’ve profiled more than 1,600 companies to date and over 15,000 comprise our region-wide readership.

We’ll profile three or four companies in every edition of the TX Mfg. Report, and do so twice a month to begin, and every week sometime in 2022. If Texas manufacturing is informed by people like Randy Bloomer, our success is guaranteed.

More, we’ll showcase manufacturers to each other across our publishing footprint, and use our SCoP supply-chain portal to connect companies with each other. Across the West. If your company can’t find a fabricator or producer across town, we may be able to help you locate one in your state, or the region. Either way, let’s keep that job in the U.S.

So buckle up and come along with us as we tell the story of Texas manufacturing through the companies and people leading it today. From California to Utah to Colorado to Texas, our reporting is showcasing the front lines of American manufacturing.

As in all our markets, if you’re a Texas-based company reading this for the first time, have your company featured — there are NO FEES. Or sponsor and advertise your brand. Manufacturers need your services.

Email me for more information.

Bart Taylor is founder and publisher of CompanyWeek. Reach him at btaylor@companyweek.com.

Bloomer Trailers

/in /by

Stitch Texas

/in /by

Manufacturing is hard. Long live Manufacturing!

/in /by

Greatness never comes easy.

The adage has never been more true for the stellar list of companies gathered last week in Denver, where winners of the 2021 Colorado Manufacturing Awards accepted trophies in person after a virtual “winners reveal” in April. Smiles, and a welcome sense of normalcy, displaced months of uncertainty and at times frustration, for one beautiful fall evening.

Yet comments from the CMA winners were uniformly blunt: Today, manufacturing is hard. Workforce and supply-chain challenges top the list — made worse by COVID-19. And for these companies, all flashing industry-leading attributes, recent headwinds only add to what still is a business culture that tilts away from manufacturing.

Their journey has clearly made success that much sweeter, though, and to a person, the companies and people in the CMA spotlight would be doing nothing else. A love of manufacturing runs deep in this group.

Others should be less sanguine. The blunt message from manufacturers here only works to emphasize a harsh truth: The consequences of abandoning U.S. manufacturing are coming home to roost, and it’s a sour symphony. The less we make here, the harder it is for companies to find employees, as products made for us by others languish in containers off the coast of California and other places. The number of vessels docked offshore seems to increase at the same rate as America’s trade imbalance — that again has reached record levels.

Many in business see it differently. Vocal, influential voices blame an inadequate supply and logistical network, not a lack of domestic manufacturing, for current disruptions. Others cite the inevitability of a service economy and downplay the importance of where products are made.

I’ve had a friendly debate going with Brian Lewandowski of the CU Leeds School of Business the past few years that goes something like this: Brian thinks I exaggerate the importance of the manufacturing economy in Colorado — and the U.S. for that matter. Even as I write this, Brian may be at work disproving my hypothesis — that the outcomes weighing on our economy have arisen as manufacturing employment has declined.

But if there’s no one to hire, it may not matter. The struggles of CMA winners to find qualified employees is more of the same. The sector is laboring through an employment crisis. To call it anything less is a dodge.

It begs the question we’ll address this fall in subsequent columns: What’s being done?

In the interim, congratulations to the people and companies in attendance last week to celebrate manufacturing — and look forward to early November when we open nominations for the 2022 Colorado Manufacturing Awards.

Bart Taylor is publisher of CompanyWeek. Email him at btaylor@companyweek.com.

2021 CMA Winners Recap: