A freight train follows a curve beside a river and an industrial campus, an imagined landscape of connected resources and choices rather than a portrait of a recommended investment location.
Compare the conditions that make a business work, then test what could go wrong
By Arbab Naseebullah Kasi, Chief Executive Officer - CEO, Feel Worldwide Foundation Inc.
Illustration: A freight train follows a curve beside a river and an industrial campus, an imagined landscape of connected resources and choices rather than a portrait of a recommended investment location.
A region can look excellent in a presentation. The building is affordable, a highway runs nearby, and an economic development representative describes an attractive incentive package. The photographs are persuasive. The proposed opening date feels achievable.
Then someone asks when the electrical connection will be ready. Another person asks whether customers will accept the longer delivery time. The operations manager wants to know who will maintain the equipment on the second shift.
These questions deserve attention before the location becomes a commitment.
The United States offers many different settings for enterprise, from established manufacturing corridors to research centers and smaller communities with room to grow. That variety creates opportunity. It also means that a sensible location for one operation can be a difficult choice for another. A credible investment case explains why a particular business can serve its customers, employ people responsibly and withstand setbacks in a particular place.
Begin with the operation you actually intend to run
Write a plain description of the proposed facility before comparing regions. A sales office, a distribution center and a production plant need different things. Even two manufacturers may have little in common if one needs large amounts of process water and the other depends on specialized engineers.
The March 2025 SelectUSA Investor Guide, particularly its site-selection chapter, begins with corporate strategy, facility purpose and stakeholder advice. It identifies workforce, logistics, real estate, business conditions and utilities as important location factors. The guide is a starting resource, including chapters contributed by practitioners, rather than a government endorsement of any proposed investment.
Translate the business plan into requirements that someone can check. How many people are needed by occupation and shift? What power, water, floor loading, storage and communications capacity will the operation require? Which customers must receive service within a specified time? How much cash can the business commit before revenue begins?
Separate essential conditions from preferences. A suitable power supply by the required date may be essential. An attractive office frontage may be desirable. A high overall score should never disguise failure on a condition that makes the operation impossible.
Define geography carefully too. A state offers a useful first comparison, but recruitment usually depends on a realistic commuting area, deliveries depend on actual routes, and utility capacity belongs to a specific site. A favorable state average cannot answer a question about one building.
Find the customers behind the market description
A large regional economy is encouraging, but it does not establish demand for a particular product. Identify the buyers you can realistically serve, what they purchase, how they select suppliers and what would persuade them to change.
For a business selling to other businesses, the Census Bureau’s 2023 County Business Patterns release, published June 26, 2025, illustrates a useful screening resource. It provides establishment counts, employment and payroll information for businesses with paid employees, with substantial industry detail. It can help investigate the presence of a potential customer or supplier sector. It does not tell you that those establishments want your product.
Compare the same industry definitions and geographic units across candidates. Record the reference year, not just the date you downloaded the file. Check coverage and disclosure limitations before interpreting a missing value as an absence of activity.
Then gather commercial evidence: customer interviews, qualification requirements, delivery expectations, trial orders and contract terms where available. Distinguish an encouraging conversation from a purchase commitment. Ask what happens if the largest prospective customer delays, changes specifications or decides to keep its existing supplier.
A regional cluster can offer access to buyers and expertise. It can also concentrate exposure to the same industry's downturn. Both observations belong in the case.
Count the skills, then investigate availability
Workforce analysis needs more detail than a regional unemployment rate. An operation requiring maintenance technicians, quality inspectors and production supervisors should examine those occupations separately. The number of people employed in a field, their wage distribution, competing employers and the time required to train new entrants all matter.
A dated example shows why occupational detail helps. In its July 8, 2026 release covering May 2025, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 40,960 production jobs in the Greenville-Anderson-Greer, South Carolina metropolitan area. They represented 9.4 percent of local employment, compared with 5.5 percent nationally. Mean hourly pay for the group was $23.48 locally and $24.81 nationally. First-line production supervisors averaged $37.30 locally.
Those figures reveal an established production workforce and meaningful differences between roles. They do not establish how many people are available to hire, whether their skills fit a particular process or what a new employer must offer now. A broad occupational average is especially weak as a ready-made pay budget.
For each finalist, speak with training providers, recruiters and employers willing to discuss local conditions. Ask about actual course capacity, completion timing, equipment used in training and recruitment bottlenecks. Include benefits, shift premiums, supervision, onboarding and retention costs in the budget. Consider whether housing, transport and childcare arrangements make the proposed shifts workable for the people you hope to employ.
Use regional prices for context, not as a factory quotation
Price comparisons can make the recruitment discussion more concrete. In its February 19, 2026 release, the Bureau of Economic Analysis reported 2024 regional price parities of 110.7 for California and 86.9 for Arkansas, with the national price level equal to 100. Those figures describe consumer price levels, including housing rents. They are not measures of industrial operating costs or investment quality.
For someone considering relocation, household prices can affect the usefulness of a salary offer. For a business, they can inform further questions about recruitment and retention. Neither conclusion permits treating the difference between two state indexes as a guaranteed saving on payroll, property or production.
Obtain comparable quotations for the operation itself. Include lease obligations, fit-out, insurance, taxes, maintenance, freight, utilities and required professional services. Compare the same capacity, quality and time period. Check who pays for improvements and what the business owes if it leaves early.
A low purchase price for an unsuitable building can be a poor bargain once alterations and delayed production enter the calculation. Equally, a higher-cost region may justify its expense through access to customers or specialist capabilities. The case should demonstrate that advantage rather than assume it.
Follow the shipment and the utility connection all the way
A map can make logistics look simpler than it is. A nearby railway does not establish that the site has usable rail service. A short distance to a port does not establish a dependable delivery schedule. Test the actual journey, including access roads, loading arrangements, carrier service, storage and the consequences of disruption.
Minnesota’s Department of Employment and Economic Development describes site selection as a staged evaluation, including resource screening, field visits, incentives review and feasibility analysis. Its guidance covers utility availability and capacity as well as transport, workforce and costs. This is practical process guidance, accessed November 9, 2026, not a ranking of locations or a promise that a marketed site is ready.
Ask the utility provider for site-specific information. Confirm the required capacity, connection schedule, upgrade responsibilities, deposits and applicable tariff. Understand demand charges and other bill components rather than comparing only a quoted energy price. For water-intensive activities, investigate supply and discharge requirements together.
Bring engineering and environmental expertise into the assessment before commitments become difficult to reverse. Review the site's condition, permissions, flood exposure, insurance availability and the route to lawful occupancy. A public description of a site as ready should lead to supporting documents and current confirmations.
Test the research relationship, not the institution’s reputation
Being close to a university can be valuable when a business needs technical collaboration, testing facilities or a continuing talent pipeline. The useful question is whether a specific capability is accessible on terms the business can use.
Identify the relevant laboratory, department or training center. Ask what equipment is available, whether external organizations may use it, who supervises the work and how long access normally takes. A facility suited to early experiments may not perform the certification or production testing your customers require.
Discuss intellectual property, confidentiality, publication, fees and responsibility for the work before assuming a collaboration is available. Confirm the institution's contracting process and who can approve an agreement. A friendly introduction is encouraging, but the financial model should not depend on unconfirmed access.
The same discipline applies to suppliers and specialist services. A region's strength becomes commercially useful through working relationships with identifiable people and organizations. Give those relationships a scope, a cost and a timetable.
Separate an incentive advertisement from money the business can use
An incentive should be recorded according to its actual stage. A website describes a program. An initial discussion may establish possible eligibility. An offer may remain conditional. An approved agreement sets obligations, and payment may follow only after performance is demonstrated. These are different positions.
North Carolina provides a concrete example. Its Job Development Investment Grant program, reviewed November 9, 2026, describes discretionary, performance-based assistance for competitive recruitment or retention projects. The general program page describes annual payments following performance review, ordinarily over terms of up to 12 years, with separate provisions for special project categories. That description is not an award to a reader of the page.
The state's community economic development agreement statute specifies matters an agreement must address. Its failure-to-comply provisions also make clear that compliance has consequences for continued assistance. Obtain professional advice on the applicable program and actual agreement rather than generalizing one state's rules to another.
For every proposed incentive, identify the amount, timing, qualifying expenditure, employment and wage obligations, reporting requirements, approval process and consequences of missed targets. Check whether a tax credit can actually be used by the business and whether an application must precede particular commitments.
Show a case without unapproved incentives. Where an award is sufficiently documented to model, account for timing, conditions, compliance costs and relevant tax treatment. Money that might arrive in a later year cannot automatically finance work that must be paid for now.
An illustrative comparison: the cheaper location becomes a closer decision
Consider a fictional small manufacturer comparing Region A and Region B. The following numbers are invented to show the method. They are not quotations, estimates for real places or a Foundation project.
Assume both locations can support the same output and 24 full-time roles, each budgeted for 2,080 paid hours annually. Region A's modeled hourly wage is $3.25 lower. That produces a wage-only difference of $162,240 a year: 24 multiplied by 2,080 multiplied by $3.25. It excludes benefits, overtime, payroll taxes and productivity differences.
Annual premises costs are assumed to be $90,000 in A and $150,000 in B, a further $60,000 difference in A's favor. Annual freight is $260,000 in A and $110,000 in B, a $150,000 disadvantage for A. Across these three categories alone, A appears $72,240 cheaper annually.
Now suppose comparable freight costs rise by 40 percent in both places. A's freight becomes $364,000 and B's becomes $154,000. The freight disadvantage grows to $210,000, reducing A's three-category advantage to $12,240.
That does not make B the automatic winner. It shows how sensitive the initial result is to one assumption. If A also needs more upfront improvements, its apparent annual saving deserves especially careful examination. If B's customer proximity improves reliability, that benefit needs evidence rather than an invented revenue premium.
The decision still requires the omitted costs, working capital, timing, taxes and realistic production assumptions. For a multiyear comparison, use consistent cash flows and an explained discount rate. Do not confuse this limited annual arithmetic with a complete investment return calculation.
Write the difficult version of the story
A useful downside scenario changes the operating conditions, then follows the consequences through cash and time. A generic statement that risks exist is not enough.
Test lower demand, slower recruitment, higher input costs and a delayed opening. Consider events occurring together. If customer volumes fall, the business may have less revenue while still owing rent and meeting minimum operating costs. A delayed connection may create storage expenses and payroll commitments before production starts.
For scale, an illustrative six-month delay with unavoidable cash outflows of $35,000 a month requires $210,000 before considering any additional financing costs. That figure is simply multiplication, not a forecast. The business must establish its own unavoidable costs and available liquidity.
Ask what can be changed if the downside appears: a smaller initial footprint, staged equipment purchases, alternative carriers, a later hiring phase or a decision to postpone. Consider contractual limits before assuming the business can scale down easily. Also test the capacity to meet incentive obligations under the weaker scenario.
Specify stop conditions. Unresolved power availability, an unaffordable cash shortfall or failure to obtain a critical customer qualification should remain visible even when the overall opportunity is attractive.
Make the recommendation traceable
A decision-maker should be able to follow the recommendation without trusting the enthusiasm of its author. Keep a dated evidence record showing the source, geography, reference period, assumptions and person responsible for verification. Distinguish official statistics, current quotations, counterpart statements and internal estimates.
Explain why each finalist remains under consideration and why others were excluded. Show the principal costs, the conditions still unresolved and what evidence would change the recommendation. Give uncertainty enough space to affect the decision.
The next authorized step might be detailed due diligence, a conditional negotiation or a smaller pilot. It need not be an immediate property commitment. Use qualified legal, tax, engineering and financial advisers where the consequences require them. A regional investment case offers no assurance of returns, incentive approval, job creation or immigration outcomes.
Responsible investment begins with confidence that has been earned. A region becomes compelling when its customers, people, infrastructure and knowledge fit the operation, and when the business can explain how it will respond if events unfold differently.
Organizations interested in a defined educational collaboration on responsible enterprise or evidence-based regional assessment can submit a partnership inquiry to Feel Worldwide Foundation. Describe the audience, proposed contribution and intended learning outcome. Any collaboration would depend on review and agreement on scope, capacity and responsibilities; an inquiry does not secure investment advice, financing or an incentive award.
To support the Foundation's wider mission, you can make a donation. Review the available giving options and terms. A donation is separate from any commercial investment decision and does not purchase a return, endorsement or preferential access.
