Branding campaign next as county seeks to lure businesses

Published 11:09 pm Monday, July 30, 2007

Whitfield County leaders looking to diversify the area’s economy should try to woo distribution and warehousing, business services, advanced manufacturing and information technology companies. That’s the advice in the first draft of a target industry report for the Dalton-Whitfield Economic Development Authority.

Authority members discussed the draft report at an all-day planning session on Monday.

“What this study really did was look at the underlying assets of the Dalton-Whitfield County area and tried to compare those with the requirements of some businesses that we think have the potential to expand,” said Bob Farley, president for economic development for Angelou Economics. The Austin, Texas-based firm is preparing the study for the development authority.

Whitfield County enjoys several advantages when it comes to attracting the industries targeted by the study: proximity to several major markets, access to I-75, very low utility rates and a relatively safe environment with no history of major wildfires, earthquakes, tornadoes or floods.

David Mansfield, president of the development authority, says the next step is to develop a “branding” campaign to put Dalton on the map and let companies in the targeted industries know about the area and its strengths.

“We’ve got to take these points and numbers that are positives for our area and get them out there to companies around the world,” Mansfield said.

Dalton-Whitfield Chamber of Commerce president George Woodward said authority members want to make sure their branding plan meshes with the marketing plans of other groups such as Target Tomorrow, the Downtown Dalton Development Authority and the Dalton Convention and Visitors Bureau. The chamber handles staff work for the development authority.

The study also pointed to some disadvantages the area has when it comes to attracting the industries it targeted.

For instance, Whitfield County, overall, has a competitive tax environment. The effective tax rate for Georgia as a whole is 44 percent higher than for Whitfield County.

But Whitfield is one of just 15 of Georgia’s 159 counties that taxes business inventory. And it is the only county north of Atlanta and on an interstate that taxes inventory.

Whitfield also has “significantly low levels of educational attainment,” according to the study. One in three Whitfield residents lacks a high school diploma. By comparison, just 14.7 percent of all U.S. residents lack a high school diploma and just 18 percent of Georgians lack a diploma.

Other findings:

• Manufacturing accounts for almost half of all jobs in Whitfield County, compared to just 13.4 percent of all jobs nationwide.

• The average annual wage in Whitfield County is $33,514, compared to $30,878 for the area north of Atlanta and $33,743 for the metro Chattanooga area.

• Since 2001, wage growth in Whitfield County has mirrored the national trend, growing by about 11-12 percent.

• Since 2000, employment in Whitfield County has grown at about three times the rate of the Chattanooga metro area, Georgia and the United States.

• Since 2000, Whitfield County’s unemployment rate has remained below the national average, and since 2002, it has remained below the state average.