Dick Larman, EDC Executive Director

As a general rule, many Americans (me included) like competition. And, by competition, I mean the honest kind. The kind of competition that causes us to be better, to try harder, and to think more broadly.

As a youngster (and son of a logging family) I remember climbing trees with my friends. While there was no stated competition, we always pushed to climb higher. When my knees would get a bit shaky someone would climb another branch or two past me. I would take a deep breath and follow. And, on occasion I would be that someone pushing higher than we had been. None of us were concerned that we weren't up to the task. Our concern was to make sure we could keep up with our friends, our community and feel up to the task. I realized, even as a youngster, not everyone likes to climb trees, or hold their breath underwater.

As we grow and age we usually work at what we acknowledge our strengths to be, and build on them to stay competitive and contribute to our family, friends and community. However, to further complicate this whole notion of competition in the current world, we are told to compete globally. In essence we are being told to compete with people and cultures we don't recognize or know. Global competition seems to have changed the view. Distrust of complex systems of trade, giant multi-national corporations that move either to fast or agonizingly slow color how we relate to the world from a local perspective.

We need to look to our family, friends, and community to see who has climbed two branches higher and ask how the view is from there. Our community has a healthy number of businesses and individuals who are working in the complex and new systems. And, they are meeting those demands of a new competition. Let's remember to ask them how that works, they are willing to listen and respond to us.

The interesting thing about climbing higher or even holding your breath is that there is now an expectation that you can do it again. Let's not shy from new expectations. Let's encourage and challenge each other to compete. And compete for a better community.

This month's featured employer is Love's. It was just last month that we saw Love's Truck Travel Center and Carl's Jr Restaurant coming to town and in construction and it looked like this.

Now here we are one month later, Love's is open, cars are lined up at the drive thru window for burgers and such and the store is stocked with lots of great items.

They hired approximately 75 people. They opened on September 22nd and if you haven't been there, you might want to check them out and spread around a few local dollars.

Marketing and Workforce Development Mgr

Recently, I attended an Economic Development Course. It was an awesome experience as well as a very heavy dose of learning about economic development. One of the classes I attended was titled "Coordinating Workforce and Economic Development: Best Practices in a tough environment." This class was taught by Sue Ambler, Workforce Development Council, Snohomish County; and Mike Brennan, Washington Workforce Training and Education Coordinating Board. The first words they shared were Relationships! Relationships! Relationships! The next two words were Partnership and Peer Development. All of these words I hear daily in our EDC office, because that is the basis for everything we do. The class ended with how important it is to establish good tenants in our business or work life, because "Good tenants in a tough environment are even better in a good environment." In working at EDC and with WorkSource, I believe we have established good tenants in our working relationships which is why it WORKS.

David Baria, Director Business Development Center

I believe a lot of business owners are still on the fence observing what is going on concerning social media and its usefulness in business. In the next few issues I will talk about social media and give you more information to help you make some critical decisions.

These contributions to the EDC newsletter should
help people, who are still not sure, understand a
little more about social media, what it is and why
it is important to business.
One definition that I have heard is "social media is
people having conversations online." These online conversations are powered by funny sounding
things such as blogs, mini blogs, online chat rooms,
RSS feeds, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, yelp and many other unclear terms.


I have recently read that Generation Y'ers (generally accepted as those born between 1981 and 1996)
now outnumber the baby boomers. Why is that important? They are the customers we need to
attract for the future of all of our businesses.

• This population group controls over $350 billion a year in spending.
• They don't care about ads.
• They care more about what their friends think.
• They don't know how to use the Yellow Pages.
  They might not even know what it is.
• 95% of them are connected to social media; and they use it to make buying decisions. 

Click here for a primer on Social Media that you might want to read. It is Constant Contacts' opinion, but there is some valuable information in this article you may want to consider. Watch for more on this subject in the October Newsletter. Read now.

Jim West, e-Enabling Implementation and Deployment Project Manager, Boeing Commercial Airlines

Why do business with Boeing?

At our General Membership Meeting Jim West presented by way of a power point how to become a supplier for Boeing.

Jim shared the principles of why and what they are looking for in suppliers. He had a very interesting power point which you will find on our website. Click here to read his entire PowerPoint presentation.