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KEDC Gives Site Tour Update

To showcase some of the facilities that now exist in the Southern Central Valley of California, the Kern Economic Development Corporation, along with other Central Valley EDC’s put together this week a site-tour for key players who may bring more business to the area.

The Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles have been for years,  two of the busiest ports in the country as shippers from around the globe have found it convenient to ship goods through California and have them sent around the country by rail or by truck.

But the slow economy and increased trucking and port regulations have seen some serious slowdowns at the port operations this year, (down more than 16-percent for the quarter)leading some experts to suggest the ports may be forced to change their strategies from being a drop and ship-east system, to more of a drop and stay-west idea as in years past.

That has transportation experts in the Central Valley excited about near term possibilities for them.

“Really what that means is most of the volume coming through LA-Long Beach may now be more for west coast consumption and Kern County really is a superior place to distribute for the west coast,” explains Barry Hibbard, a transportation and logistics expert with Tejon Ranch Corporation, one of the biggest farming operations and land development companies in the South Valley.

Tejon’s Industrial parks now include the huge IKEA warehouse that services the entire west coast from its Bakersfield location.   Tejon is about to expand to the east side of Interstate 5 to add even more storage and warehousing space for businesses which may want to come here.

 “And if you look at the companies that really use their supply chains to a competitive advantage, companies like Target, Sears, IKEA, those are all the leaders in the industry that truly do that, they have been here for a while and are probably just ahead of the game,” concludes Hibbard.

To capitalize on that concept and to showcase some of the facilities that now exist in the Southern Central Valley of California, the Kern Economic Development Corporation, along with other Central Valley EDC’s put together this week a site-tour for key players who may bring more business to the area.

After an initial meeting at the Seven Oaks Country Club, the site-tour organizers and their guests boarded a bus and drove around the county to see first-hand some of the options that are and will soon be available.

One such location was here near the Bakersfield airport.

There are several areas under development including this land east of the airport being developed by the Visalia based Allen Group.

Across the road CB Richard Ellis is developing this industrial park… and the site-tour stopped briefly so the out of town guests could get more information about land costs and square footage rents.

“I agree with what Barry is saying and I think the Central Valley has a growing population and that population is going to need to be serviced so there will need to be industrial and warehousing, and the logistics industry will come up here as the population grows.  So there is definitely an opportunity.  (How does this compare to the Inland Empire?)  I think Barry pegged it right on.  This is definitely like what the Inland Empire was 20-years ago.  There’s plenty of ag-land ready to convert as the population grows and there’s a need for more and more warehousing up here.” Explains Craig Halverson, VP of Acquisitions for  the Los Angeles based Watson Land Company.

With the state imposing more and more restrictions on trucking industry, there is a growing driver shortage now that could increase to shortages of 100-thousand by next year in California.

Hibbard told those at the site tour that one reason IKEA has been so successful since moving to Kern County in 1999 has been a more stable work force that has been very loyal and does not move around as frequently as workers in other areas move.

He says IKEA, Sears, Target and others have moved to the Valley finding their truck drivers stay with them because they can go North to the Bay area or South to San Diego and return home in one work day allowing them to spend nights with their families, which they’ve found to be a key quality of life issue.