In This Issue
Pipeline to the world
TEXpansion: Candy maker sweetens Grand Prairie
School district takes on transparency
Teamwork pays off for Mount Pleasant
Partnering for Impact: Boost your sales tax collections
Texas housing among strongest in the nation
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Local Government Steps for Success
Edinburg
Edinburg’s EDC office in Monterrey, Mexico, played a pivotal role in convincing Santana Textiles and other international companies to consider a Texas location. While several Texas cities, including Edinburg, have a tourism office in Northern Mexico, Edinburg officials made trade connections a priority, says Ramiro Garza, executive director for the Edinburg EDC.
“Having that office has helped us with coordinating and communicating with these companies,” Garza says.
Prior to helping win Santana, the office successfully attracted a Merkafon Teleperformance International call center to Edinburg in 2003, resulting in 800 jobs.
Finding the Ideal Fit
Edinburg Lands World’s Fourth-Largest Denim Maker
Editor’s Note: The following article appeared in the March/April 2009 issue of Texas Rising.
In July 2008, Santana Textiles selected Edinburg as the perfect fit for the location of its $180 million denim production plant, the Brazilian company’s first venture into the United States. The 300,000-square-foot facility, the first phase of which is scheduled to open next year, is expected to create at least 800 local jobs, not including construction. The plant would become Edinburg’s largest manufacturing employer when operating at full capacity in 2014.
“The manufacturing sector is key to any community because the economic spin-off from it is far greater than other sectors,” says Ramiro Garza Jr., executive director for the Edinburg Economic Development Corporation (EDC). “Every manufacturing job created typically generates at least three more jobs for the community.”
Seizing an Opportunity
EDC officials pursued the idea of bringing the world’s fourth-largest denim producer to Texas after officials learned of Santana’s search for a North American location. The company currently employs about 1,800 people among its five locations in Brazil and Argentina.
“We knew early on that funding the land was critical to this,” Garza says. In a matter of months, Edinburg EDC donated a 33-acre industrial park site, valued at $1 million, and secured a $1.65 million investment from the state’s Texas Enterprise Fund, a first for South Texas.
Santana officials considered several locations in Honduras, Nicaragua and Mexico. These included Linares, Mexico — a city about the size of Edinburg with a population of approximately 60,000. But Edinburg’s location gave Santana better access to Texas cotton fields and its customized training options will provide a strong work force, says Roberto Cantu, general director for Santana Textiles.
“The reasons for choosing Edinburg as a base for the construction of our first plant in North America include the support provided by the state of Texas and the city of Edinburg, the strategic location in the NAFTA and CAFTA (Central America Free Trade Agreement) market, the proximity to our primary raw material (cotton), to be inside the largest consumer market for jeans and a qualified work force,” Cantu says.
High-Tech Textiles
A skilled work force plays a key role in producing denim, which involves a highly automated process based on Santana Textiles’ technology, Cantu says.
“As far as the work force is concerned, we are depending on the help of the government of Edinburg and the universities in the region to employ and train workers together with our people from Brazil,” Cantu says.
Workforce Solutions in Edinburg, the work force development board for Hidalgo, Starr and Willacy counties, is performing an occupational analysis for the company, translating job duties and descriptions from the Brazil plant. Santana is set to hire 85 administrative and support staff and about 300 workers for the initial production line this year.
“Because it’s new technology, we’re offering customized training for employees,” says Jason Moreno, business development director for Workforce Solutions. The average wage at the company is estimated at $26,500 a year, which is about average for manufacturing jobs in the area.
The Fabric of Texas
Santana isn’t the first textile company to locate to Rio South Texas. Levi Strauss & Co. and the Haggar Corp. had large clothing assembly operations there, but they closed in the late 1990s, taking nearly 3,500 jobs with them.
Santana, on the other hand, converts cotton into denim through spinning, weaving and dyeing, producing an estimated 7.7 million yards per month. The company does not yet supply denim to the United States, but hopes Edinburg will be an entry point to American blue jean consumers, who spent an estimated $5.2 billion in 2006. TR
For updates and more information on the Santana Textiles plant, visit the Edinburg Economic Development Corporation at www.edinburgedc.com.