Quality Record Pressings (Salina, Kansas)

In a cluttered office, Chad Kassem, owner of Quality Record Pressings (and Acoustic Sounds, Analogue Productions and several other vinyl-related businesses), said to me, “Sit here,” pointing to his own chair. As I watched him load one of his reissues of a Shelby Lynne record onto the player he commanded, “No, face the speakers.” As the music began, I instinctively glanced around for Shelby Lynne herself – her voice was so clear and immediate. I likened the experience to the first time I put on glasses. “I didn’t know you were supposed to see this well!” I exclaimed to my mother.

At home, we play old records. By “old,” I mean the type you pick up at a garage sale or thrift store. I enjoy the round, mellow sound of vinyl but I never imagined how much of the sound I was missing. Analogue Productions has reissued many old favorites from the Doors to Nat “King” Cole to Elvis Presley, and even some relative newbies like Norah Jones. Chad started Quality Record Pressings because his small company, Analogue Productions was dropping to the back of the line at record pressing companies as records have become a popular way to release albums at large record labels. For a vinyl-o-phile like Chad, the only option for pressing his own records was to make the best pressings possible. They now not only press their own reissues and the artists they produce, they also press records for almost every major label out there. They have been featured on NPR and in the New York Times with awed confusion. What is the best record pressing company doing in rural Kansas?

It is what I call historical accident. There is no reason that the company is here except that it is where Chad moved in 1984 from Lafayette, Louisiana. He did not move to start a business, or for some spectacular incentive package, but, “to get sober.” He started buying and reselling records. As he expanded he moved from his apartment, to a house, to a commercial space. Then he started adding more businesses to his portfolio. He reissued vinyl albums. Then he produced his own artists, such as legends like Honeyboy Edwards and Weepin’ Willie as well as young blues artists like Noah Wotherspoon and Marquise Knox in his Blue Heaven Studios, a renovated church down the road from Chad’s offices. His most recent addition has been Quality Record Pressings (QRP).

“You can say it’s in the middle of nowhere or you can say it’s in the middle of everywhere.” Chad said about Salina Kansas. Perhaps that was his pitch to Gary Salstrom (pictured above inspecting a master after the initial bath). Gary left RTI in Southern California to join Kassem and manage QRP. He takes the master through the plating process to produce the stampers. The stampers are then used in the room next door to stamp the records using vintage record presses (new record presses have not been produced since the early 1980s). The presses have been re-engineered and include electronic sensors to gauge temperature so that the operator now has even higher quality control of the record. The records are tested for quality and the ones that do not meet the exacting standards are recycled.

Chad brought in Gary to manage the plant but the people who operate the machines are not specially trained in record making. Many have backgrounds in HVAC systems and are comfortable with the types of operations that record machines perform. The re-engineering of the machines was also done locally. The innovation happening “in the middle of everywhere,” is a combination of Chad’s vision, Gary’s expertise and about 50 employees who were able to adapt to a “new” product. Would it be possible for this company to exist anywhere?

Probably not. Chad is committed to Salina because of his employees and his daughter. He likes the quality of the workforce and the quality of the schools. Though he speaks longingly of Southern Louisiana, he seems disinclined to move his family and employees down there despite its well-established blues music industry. “You meet a child here and they are very educated and very smart and very well spoken, you know….This is a good place to raise children, I think….The schools are better. It’s a big plus.” When I look at a company like Chad’s suite of businesses and listen to his story, I see the future of rural America. It is not a call center or an auto plant or a distribution center that will save Small Town, USA. It is the guy out of rehab that has a passion for records.

Slattery Vintage Estates (Nehawka, Nebraska)

One stop on the Scenic Weeping Water Valley Trail is Slattery Vintage Estates. At the end of a rolling road in rural Cass County, the vineyard and tasting room is a Saturday night dinner date, a weekend retreat, or an afternoon tasting the best of Nebraska. It is hard to pin down exactly what it is because it is continually evolving but you can bet it is a good time. 

Barb and Mike Slattery bought the land when they retired and planted the vineyard. They both came from families with farming roots and fondly hoped to be able to retire on a little plot of land in the country. Initially, they planned a bed and breakfast in the vineyard setting. Then they opened a tasting room and restaurant. They added live music on Saturday nights. Their most recent addition is four “bungalows” that are somewhere between a tent and an antique bedroom. Soon, they will even be bottling some of their own wine.

The wine industry has come a long way since the 1976 “Judgement of Paris” when California wines – Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars in the red category and Chateau Montelena in the white category – won over French wines at the Paris Wine Tasting. Since then, new world wines – those from the US, Latin America and Australia – have come to dominate the wine market. This is driven in part by an increase in wine consumption in the US.** As wine consumption has increased so have the number of vineyards and wine makers. In 2012, 41 states reported taxable production to the Alcohol and Tabacco Tax and Trade Bureau and a total of 651.1 million gallons of still and sparkling wine was bottled.* Almost any state that could call itself an “agricultural” state now has a wine industry. I attribute this to the growing interest in local foods.

A part of the local food movement is an interest in where and how your food is grown. Farms that participate in community supported agriculture programs often encourage their members to come out and watch the cucumbers grow. When we lived in Illinois, we were members of Triple S Farms in Stewardson, Illinois. They have an annual “visit the farm day” and send monthly emails to members detailing what they have in stock and what is happening with the cows, pigs and chickens out on the prairie. Grapes are considerably more picturesque than pigs, even naturally raised pigs, so when you visit a vineyard, you might want to hang around a little longer.

That is what the Slatterys are hoping for. In their tasting room, they focus on Nebraska made wines and are eager to explain the nuances of grape growing in Nebraska. They have learned their technique from the foremost grape growers in Nebraska, Dr. Paul Read and Steve Gamet, who currently head the viticulture program at the University of Nebraska Lincoln. Dr. Read and Mr. Gamet have been instrumental in developing, testing and promoting grape varieties that grow well in Nebraska. The Slatterys and other vineyards have benefited from this research. They are members of the Nebraska Winery and Grape Growers Association and are active in the annual winery and grape growing conference held each year to support wine makers and growers of the Northern hybrid grapes.

“I’m proud of Nebraska wines now. At first it was touch and go. But now!” Barb said. “People that come in and say, ‘oh, Nebraska wines,’ I’ll say, ‘I’ll challenge you. I’ll show you some that you will like. Even if you’re from California or Washington, we can find some that you’ll like.’” Perhaps it is time for a Judgment of California.

* Kurtzleben, Danielle. “U.S. Beer and Wine-Making Growth Spikes.” US News and World Report August 9, 2012. (http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/08/09/us-beer-and-wine-making-growth-spikes)

** Monthly Statistical Release – Wine. January 2012 through December 2012. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (http://www.ttb.gov/wine/wine-stats.shtml). The states that did not report taxable production are Alaska, Mississippi, Nevada, North Dakota, Rhode Island, Utah, Wyoming.

Custom Wood Products (St. Marys, Kansas)

“Can I take pictures?” I always ask before touring a manufacturing facility. To me, pictures are a representation of the industrial aesthetic that I admire and an embodiment of the creative process at work (and I mean, “creative” in the literal sense!). However, pictures may give away trade secrets to competitors – the secrets of the trade that are NOT in the air, to paraphrase Alfred Marshall. When I asked Kevin Gray, CEO of Custom Wood Products if I could take pictures during the tour of his 100,000 square foot cabinet making facility, he readily agreed. Then he paused and qualified it, “There’s some things that I would like for my competition not to see…I’ll let you know.”

At about 135 employees, Custom Wood Products is one of the largest employers in St. Marys. There are complementary businesses in the area, such as the Onyx Collection, from which Custom Wood Products sources some counter tops. But other suppliers are located in the upper Midwest, the Northwest and other parts of the country. Those firms, in turn, source wood from all over the country. The finished cabinets are delivered across the central plains, Florida, Texas, and Arizona with the possibility of expansion to the West Coast soon. The secrets learned by employees at Custom Wood Products may be in the air in St. Marys but there are not many other places that they can be put to use without going pretty far away.

I was fascinated to learn that the secrets Kevin referred to are not in the fabrication of the cabinets. The machines – industrial table saws that will not cut your hand when you run your fingers through the moving blade, enormous tools that can make tens of feet of French dovetail joints in minutes, devices that detect flaws in the wood and maximize each board for the day’s projects – are available to any cabinet maker. The secrets are in the organization of the shop floor and the process of moving projects through from unloading the lumber to loading the delivery truck. The specialized format allows the company to focus on the crafting of the product instead of moving it around the shop (because 100,000 square feet is a lot of shop to move around!). The secrets are also in the employees who still do some of the process by hand. All of the cabinets are custom. The designers’ imaginations may not have limits but the machines do. Special pieces are crafted by hand and the cabinets are finished by individuals applying a particular combination of finishes or distressing techniques to the doors for an antique, lived-in feel.

In an agglomeration economy, the trade secrets are supposedly are no longer secrets at all, but common knowledge among the skilled labor pool. Often when economic developers discuss agglomeration, they are talking about many firms in one industry NAICS code. But agglomeration, in the sense that Alfred Marshall speaks of it, is a group of complimentary firms. This is especially apparent in rural areas where the market and the labor force will not support multiple firms engaged in creating similar products. Custom Wood Products was started in 1981 by Don Lake, a local home builder. The construction industry (though it has taken a hit in recent years, consistent with the rest of the country) still employs close to 2,500 people in the Manhattan metropolitan area (St. Marys is on the edge).* In addition, there are firms like the Onyx Collection that have commercial relationships. Custom Wood Products is located in an industrial park-like area on the edge of St. Marys. The businesses there may not have formal relationships but all benefit from the public goods, such as the easy truck access, that St. Marys provides. 

In the shop, most employees are from around St. Marys but some travel for almost an hour for work every day, a commute that rivals that of many urban workers.. They come in with unfinished wood and, each doing his or her piece of the process, create kitchen cabinets, home entertainment cabinets, bathrooms, and other storage areas. They are the true creative class. They literally create.

* County Business Patterns 2010. Construction industry includes the establishments in NAICS codes 236, 237, and 238.

Make It In America Challenge

I find manufacturing of all types to be inspirational. I get a kick out of seeing things being made and witnessing the results of innovative thinking. I feel patriotic when I see the “Made in USA” slogans. That said, I am enough of an economist to understand that trade makes us stronger and to believe in comparative advantage. If China manufacturing iPhones allows people in the US to make more of other stuff, I think that is a good idea. However, if the product is not being made in the US simply because of bureaucratic obstacles or because of other entry barriers (remember, free entry and exit is a primary tenant of Adam Smith’s free market), we should remedy it.

I was excited to learn about a new grant opportunity from the Economic Development Administration. The Make It In America Challenge is an initiative that pulls together the Economic Development Administration, the National Institute of Standards and Technology Manufacturing Extension Partnership and the Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration. Through the challenge, these agencies will be awarding up to $40 million to states, local governments, and other entities to implement projects that will help companies expand jobs, train workers, upgrade business resources and develop municipal infrastructure. All things that will lower the entry cost for new firms and help existing businesses be successful in America, the beautiful.