Back to Work

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

While it may be some time before deepwater drilling resumes, the new ‘idle iron’ policy could create 13,000 jobs in the state over the next five years.

The lifting of the federal moratorium on deepwater drilling was a first step in resuming operations in the Gulf of Mexico, but there is still a long road ahead for the industry. Industry experts do not see that the lifting of the moratorium will have an immediate impact on U.S. oil production. Between the proposed tax incentive repeals that have loomed over the industry for a couple of years, to opposition to hydraulic fracturing, to the de facto ban on offshore drilling, it could be some time before Gulf production returns to levels reached prior to the moratorium.

Digital Effects

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

With average annual wages of more than $50,000 in 2007, digital jobs in Acadiana are expanding at double the growth rate of the state. By Gregg Gothreaux

In the digital age, you’re never disconnected when your smartphone is in your pocket. It’s almost unthinkable to be unable to email a client or friend from the road. With Skype and FaceTime, you can be at virtually any meeting, anywhere. As the technology we depend on for day-to-day activities evolves, digital media have had a growing impact on people and how we relate with each other.

Strength in Unity

Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Written by Gregg Gothreaux

LEDA is one of several Acadiana commerce labs ready to help your business grow.

Many ABiz readers are probably familiar with LEDA and our regional ally, Acadiana Economic Development, and the services both organizations provide through this column, if not from first-hand experience. I thought this month would be a great opportunity to share with you some of the specific services LEDA and AED offer that may benefit your business while we are in this economic transition period — emerging from the national recession while faced with uncertainty spawned by the oil spill and drilling moratorium.

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Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Written by Gregg Gothreaux

LEDA is one of several Acadiana commerce labs ready to help your business grow.

Many ABiz readers are probably familiar with LEDA and our regional ally, Acadiana Economic Development, and the services both organizations provide through this column, if not from first-hand experience. I thought this month would be a great opportunity to share with you some of the specific services LEDA and AED offer that may benefit your business while we are in this economic transition period — emerging from the national recession while faced with uncertainty spawned by the oil spill and drilling moratorium.

Let’s start with the basics. LEDA’s mission is to provide assistance to existing businesses and start-ups and to attract new businesses to Lafayette Parish. AED works with the economic development entities in Acadia, Evangeline, Iberia, Lafayette, St. Landry, St. Martin and Vermilion parishes to provide similar services — business retention and development on a regional level. We do this in several ways.

LEDA works to facilitate existing business retention and expansion within the parish through our business visitation program. Each year, our staff meets one-on-one with decision-makers from more than 550 unique businesses. We discuss how our organizations can assist their businesses within the scope of our services, including tax incentive education and workforce training program application assistance, and ombudsman services. At mid-year, LEDA staff has already met with 265 unique businesses across Lafayette Parish and continually works to reach favorable resolutions to your business concerns. Complementary to LEDA’s business visitation program are AED’s Synchronist visitations that I wrote about last month.

LEDA and AED can help a start-up or expanding business locate potential sites for development. Our Business Development and Information Services departments track more than 850 pieces of property including individual office space and suites, retail, industrial, commercial and land. We work closely with commercial real estate agents to provide accurate and up-to-date information on available properties to our clients. Whether it’s a 1,000-square-foot office space or a 20,000-square-foot warehouse, we’ll work closely with our real estate allies to find the property that best fits your needs.

We also offer market analysis assistance for existing and prospective businesses. Our team of researchers has access to data points ranging from retail sales to employment figures and can gather competitor and consumer data to assist in the growth and development of small business. We understand that positioning a small business involves more than just finding a location; it also encompasses perception, feasibility, efficiency and many other variables that differ across industries. We take the time to learn about those variables and use that knowledge to produce an accurate analysis of your target market or location of interest. So far this year, our researchers have answered nearly 400 inquiries for information from our clients. This can be as simple as the population of Lafayette Parish to something as complex as an economic impact study.

Workforce is a hot issue, and we work directly with business to address it. We actively promote workforce training funding programs to Acadiana employers to help them obtain the skilled workforce necessary for their operation and growth. In FY 2009-2010, Acadiana businesses were awarded $950,524 in Small Business Employee Training awards. Small businesses in the Lafayette area received nearly one third of the total SBET awards approved statewide. That’s a 282 percent increase in training funds from just four years ago.

Additionally, Acadiana businesses were awarded more than $5.5 million dollars in Incumbent Worker Training Program grants. Each August, we host the LEDA Job Fair; with nearly 100 employers and thousands of job seekers, the LEDA Job Fair is the largest job recruitment event in Acadiana.

LEDA also offers education and networking opportunities in the form of seminars and our monthly networking luncheon. This year, we have hosted five free seminars on topics such as government contracting and workforce training opportunities. In September, we are hosting our annual Commercial Realtor/Developer Seminar on the 15th and a Business Incentive Discussion on the 21st. And, anyone who has been to our networking luncheon can attest that we have a good time while helping our attendees make valuable business connections.

Finally, our facility, the LEDA Resource Center, is available for business use at no charge. Conveniently located in the Research Park of UL Lafayette’s University Common, the facility offers numerous amenities to your business. It is the perfect location to hold company trainings and seminars or to make a presentation to a special client. Our two meeting rooms feature audio-visual equipment and presentation equipment for meetings with two to 75 people and have been used by nearly 90 businesses in 2010.

Aside from LEDA and AED, there are several organizations in the region that offer complementary and specialized services for local businesses, both start-ups and established. The Louisiana Small Business Development Center, Procurement Technical Assistance Center, Enterprise Center of Louisiana, Women’s Business Center and The Accelerator offer varying levels of guidance, support and education. Stay tuned because my column next month will go into further detail about The Accelerator — a joint venture between LEDA, LITE, UL Lafayette and the Greater Lafayette Chamber of Commerce — and how it facilitates the creation of new and innovative, tech-intensive businesses in Acadiana.

Acadiana has strong entrepreneurial roots in every industry from farming to retail to services. Entrepreneurs and business owners have taken their commercial success and translated it into opportunities for new entrepreneurs and new business development, as well as for the overall growth of the community. It is small business — existing businesses growing with the parish and new businesses relocating or starting up in the area — that keep Lafayette’s economy fresh, vibrant and diversified. LEDA’s services used in tandem with those provided by organizations such as those listed above can keep a small business on the right track, helping to keep the entrepreneurial spirit alive and well in Acadiana.

Gregg Gothreaux is president and chief executive officer of the Lafayette Economic Development Authority. To comment on this column, e-mail This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

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LEDA BY THE NUMBERS

Business Retention and Expansion
Business Visitations — annual goal of 550
2009    581
2010    265

Business Seminars

2009 - 6 free seminars with 297 attendees
2010 - 5 free seminars with 235 attendees

Workforce Development
LEDA Job Fair — now in its 15th year

2009 - 80 businesses
More than 3,000 job seekers
2010 - 83 businesses (as of 8/13)

Workforce Development Training Awards — FY 09-10

Incumbent Worker Training Program (IWTP)
$5,513,022 awarded in Acadiana
Small Business Employee Training (SBET)
$950,524 awarded in Acadiana

Information Services (Research)
Client Inquiries — requests for information, including but not limited to demographics, statistics, market research and economic impact studies
2009 - 600
2010 - 369

Properties for sale or lease
LEDA tracks 850 properties including individual office space and suites, retail, industrial, commercial and land.
Statistics tracked
54 different statistics tracked on a monthly, quarterly, semi-annual and annual basis. Other statistics can be tracked or researched upon client request.

Administration
Facility Usage — LEDA’s Conference Room and Development Room are available for business use, free of charge
2009 - 145 businesses, 3,678 attendees
2010 - 85 businesses, 2,237 attendees
2010 - reflects activities through 6/30/10

Strength in Numbers

Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Written by Gregg Gothreaux

By combining forces with neighboring parishes, LEDA assesses Acadiana’s business climate, and if not for the drilling moratorium, we’d be sitting rather pretty.

With a goal of meeting with more than 500 unique businesses a year through our business visitation program, the LEDA staff keeps a thumb on the pulse of the business community in Lafayette. We’re not an island, however. Lafayette is heavily impacted by the economic activity of our neighboring parishes. Because of this interdependence, LEDA and our economic development counterparts in the six neighboring parishes formed the Acadiana Economic Development Council in 2004. Since then, AEDC has conducted nearly 550 visits with business leaders from the top companies across Acadiana. Using a specialized information-gathering questionnaire called Synchronist, AEDC representatives are able to produce reports with some telling numbers about the business climate in Acadiana.

The Synchronist Report is an overall assessment of how business is doing. It contains questions to measure market conditions, industry trends, management outlook, workforce, technology innovations and gauge satisfaction with community services. AEDC compiles the results and shares them quarterly with the business leaders they have interviewed and with state legislators to illustrate business concerns. Finally, because agencies across the state use the same report, Louisiana Economic Development is able to use the regional data as part of statewide aggregate data collection and reporting system.

Using results from the last 65 companies visited in 2009 and results from the 50 business visitations conducted so far in 2010, AEDC has compiled this snapshot of Acadiana’s business climate.

Company Sales
The first half of 2010 has, so far, painted a better revenue picture than 2009. More than 84 percent of companies surveyed this year reported that sales have remained stable or have grown slightly. The tone of most visitations since the beginning of the year has been largely optimistic and demonstrates the strength of the Acadiana business community. However, visits conducted in late second quarter and early third quarter with energy companies have begun to reflect concerns stemming from the Gulf oil spill and the subsequent offshore drilling moratorium, which stands to stifle the earlier gains of the regional economy in 2010.

Market Share
In the first half of 2010, the majority of business respondents (70 percent) reported they have maintained their market share. In these cautious times, being able to maintain a stable market share is a business success. While the 30 percent who say they have increased their market share is less than in 2009, it is important to note that no one reported a decrease in market share in 2010.

Layoff Projections
The layoff projections of the first half of 2010 painted a positive employment picture for Acadiana. The Gulf of Mexico oil spill occurred in the second quarter, yet interviewees from energy companies have not yet responded with any large-scale layoffs. Energy-related companies have been as resourceful as possible to minimize layoffs but will be faced with tough decisions in the months to come. Those who stated that layoffs are likely in the near term were interviewed after the oil spill. Visits so far in the third quarter also reflect this trend.

Workforce Evaluation
Acadiana business leaders were asked to rank certain attributes of the local workforce on a scale of one to seven, with seven being best. While availability of workforce is on the higher end, the overall quality and stability of our local workforce is considered to be just slightly above average. With the overall volatility of 2009 and rising unemployment numbers, workforce availability is no surprise. The first half of 2010 is very similar to 2009, showing some workforce shifting still occurring in the marketplace; however, recent visitations have shown that employee turnover is beginning to slow in many areas.

Visitations conducted so far in the third quarter have been more subdued compared to the first half of the year. As events unfold concerning the cessation and clean-up of the oil spill, businesses may be impacted positively or negatively, and this will be reflected in future Synchronist reports. With the potential to lose more than 7,000 jobs over the next year in Acadiana, our economy is in a holding pattern until a resolution or compromise is reached over the offshore drilling moratorium.
As business leaders, you should all participate in a Synchronist visitation if you are contacted by AED. Specifics from the interviews are confidential and will help LEDA and AEDC advocate for policies that will help businesses across Acadiana in the future.  

Gregg Gothreaux is president and chief executive officer of the Lafayette Economic Development Authority. To comment on this column, e-mail This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Get off the roller coaster

Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Written by Gregg Gothreaux

Streamlining government and efforts to limit government to reign in budget shortfalls have not worked because they fail to take on the essential problem — Louisiana’s tax system.

For years, state leadership has wrestled with Louisiana’s budget roller coaster. The story’s no different in the session that ended June 21. With legislators debating whether to tap into the Budget Stabilization Fund, contemplating cuts to higher education and health care, and the disastrous oil spill in the Gulf and subsequent drilling moratorium, the state’s budget has seen better days...