Quincy Is Lowest Cost Small City For High-tech Manufacturing In The West

May 2, 2010 - PRLog -- Quincy, Wash - After attracting Microsoft, Yahoo and Intuit data centers to the area, Quincy is now hoping to land high-tech manufacturing.  

A recent national study by the Boyd Company ranks the small Central Washington city, located about halfway between Wenatchee and Moses Lake off I-90, as the least expensive small city in the West to open a factory for high-tech manufacturing such as precision metalwork, engineered plastics or carbon composites.

According to a comparison of 45 small cities, Quincy ranked 9th in the country based on costs for labor, power, land and construction and taxes.

Following are the rankings:
1. Lenoir, North Carolina
2. Starkville, Mississippi
3. Ardmore, Oklahoma
4. Pryor Creek, Oklahoma
5. Goose Creek, South Carolina
6. Lenanon, Tennessee
7. Crestview, Florida
8. Lynn Haven, Florida
9. Quincy, Washington
10. Big Spring, Texas

Jack Boyd, president of the Boyd Company, said Quincy could very easily attract companies that want to leave California. "When you are looking at the West, the tradtional options to California have changed dramatically over the last 10 to 15 years," he said, citing Tempe and Phoenix as examples. "They've become victims of their own success."

Located in the Columbia River Basin in central Washington, the area has attracted major facilities such as Microsoft, Yahoo, Intuit, REC Silicon, Columbia Colstor International, ConAgra Foods and BMW-SGL.

Quincy's strengths are that it has plentiful, low cost and green hydroelectric power.  It is also rich in fiber optics, is located on the main line of the BNSF railroad and is linked to port facilities in Seattle/Tacoma via I-90.  Water, which is in short supply in many western cities, is abundant in Quincy and its unique microclimate boasts 300 days of sunshine.

Patrick Boss, the director of public affairs and economic development for the Port of Quincy, said that while large companies like Microsoft, Yahoo and Intuit were coming to Quincy to build data centers, the Port of Quincy only had anecdotal evidence as to why these companies were attracted to Quincy.  "Now we have an objective report with actual comparative data," said Boss.

"Given the data in the study, we feel that Quincy has a bright future in attracting other types of high-tech companies, especially companies that maybe don’t want to be in higher cost, more highly populated and congested areas.....We think there are other high-tech industry sectors that need large bandwidth dark fiber, competitively priced and abundant hydroelectric power, and easy access to rail and interstate freeways," Boss said.