Ecodev owner tries to
keep jobs in North America
Dana Olson is on a mission to keep companies or bring companies into North America. “That’s our purpose,” Olson says.
As founder of Ecodev LLC in Bloomington, a site selection service for companies that are expanding or relocating, he runs counter to popular rhetoric toward outsourcing production abroad.
He believes most smaller companies, under $200 million in revenue, do better if they expand in North America.
“We’re trying to give them an alternative to outsourcing their production, or turning it over to a big company and losing control,” Olson says.
“What you keep hearing about is labor is $2 an hour. If you’re set up all over the world it is cheaper. But if you only have one production site” probably it’s not, what with taxes and customs, legal problems and “serious quality issues.”
Ecodev first goes through each client’s physical needs, focusing on labor, to find the optimal geographic location. Next, they find a package of grants and incentives available through various economic development funds.
His firm charges a fee for the analysis part, and then charges a percentage of the incentive and grant money acquired.
He was chief operating officer for 12 years for a large publicly held company, and he spent lots of time scouting sites. “I kept databases on all our searches.”
Olson says states compete to attract businesses, some more aggressively than others. “We’ve done projects in Canada, and more in Nebraska than any other state. Texas, too.”
Asked if he gets criticized for moving jobs out of Minnesota, he has an answer ready. “I have never moved a company out of Minnesota. I have helped companies do their expansion out of Minnesota.”
He enjoyed the irony of a recent contact in Texas, where he met a man who was locating a computer programming operation in the state. “The man was Indian. His company is in Bangladore, but he’s having labor problems. So he’s hiring programmers outside of Dallas,” Olson says.
Dana Olson, Ecodev LLC: 952.944.0012; dana@ecodevllc.com; www.ecodevllc.com
