APPROACH:
Building on the success of its previous reports, the Boston Consulting Group Operations and Global Advantages practices will educate the international business community about the economic advantages of producing in the United States by publishing four new, formal manufacturing reports over the next year and disseminating the findings to a high level audience.
Using the expertise and capacity of their global consulting staff, BCG will perform original research on four topics: the skills gap, the impact of low cost natural gas on manufacturing, the impact of lower cost automation on manufacturing, and reshoring manufacturing from a retailer's perspective.
Boston Consulting Group's communications team will publicize the American Manufacturing reports through the company's subscriber service and press lists. The reports will generate at least 200 press mentions in the next year.
ACTION PLAN:
Report 1: Exports (estimated release in Q4 2012)
Report 2: The Skills Gap (estimated release in Q1 2013)
Report 3: Energy (estimated release in Q2 2013)
Report 4: Automation (estimated release in Q3 2013
In August 2011, The Boston Consulting Group released the report, 'Made in America, Again: Why Manufacturing Will Return to the US,' and explained how a 15 to 20 percent increase in Chinese wages and other factors were eroding China's manufacturing cost advantage over the US.
In March 2012, the BCG Operations and Global Advantages practices released a second formal report, 'US Manufacturing Nears the Tipping Point: Which Industries, Why and How Much?' The second report identifies seven broad industry sectors likely to reach a point in the next five years where China's reduced cost advantage should prompt companies to consider moving production operations closer to their North America point of sale.
Through research, the BCG reports identify macroeconomic trends that will affect the cost structure of global production that should encourage companies to reassess their global manufacturing footprints. BCG's message of US competitiveness is spread directly to thousands of high level executives and indirectly through over 200 national and international media channels to millions of manufacturers.
