Celebrating 15 years of solid data on reshoring to the South and Mexico

By Michael Randle

 

This administration’s efforts to tariff countries on imports is an effort, I assume, at attracting more reshored jobs and investments back to the U.S. In just six months, that effort has been choppy at best, but with some notable success in capturing large, agreed-upon deals, mostly foreign projects, directly from the presidential level. 

In the South, we love our FDI as the region is without doubt the region of choice for foreign direct investment in North America. 

But, few know the history of the words “reshoring” and “nearshoring,” like, when did it start and who started publishing that data? 

Real data on reshored investments and jobs is relatively easy to come by today, whether the source is SB&D, Site Selection, the Boston Consulting Group (“Made in America, Again”), the Bureau of Labor Statistics or the Reshoring Initiative and its founder, Harry Moser. Harry began tracking the trend in 2010. His data can be accessed at reshorenow.org

All were sources that started researching and writing about reshoring, first in 2010, then 2011, and we have been writing about it ever since because it is a source of hundreds of thousands of jobs in the U.S. and Mexico. 

Hardly anyone noticed the aforementioned sources above, which, collectively, are the true sources and the inventors and creators of the words “reshoring” and “nearshoring” (Mexico). 

This is when I discovered reshoring was real after a couple of years reading and writing about it

A major project was announced on September 21, 2011. Tokyo-based Bridgestone (North American headquarters is in Nashville) announced the construction of a new 1.5 million-square-foot off-road radial tire plant near its existing facilities in Aiken (Graniteville, S.C.). The expansion also included an additional 474,000 square feet of its original plant there. With an investment of $1.2 billion, it was the largest investment made at the time in South Carolina history. Nikki Haley was the governor then.

Just another Southern deal, right? No, not hardly. 

On March 11, 2011, while I was covering the project, someone told me — it was either officials of Bridgestone or the South Carolina Department of Commerce — that, “We can manufacture the tires cheaper in Aiken for ‘U.S. consumption’ than almost anywhere in China.” Me: “Show me the facts.” 

Note the phrase “U.S. consumption,” which I had never heard until 15 years ago. So, that alone made up the need for new words or phrases on the effects of reshoring such as “make it where you sell it,” which added one more reason why reshoring is a real thing. Because “make it where you sell it” shortens supply chains and eliminates shipping costs. Simply put, reshoring is a result of importing less and producing more. 

Bridgestone did an about-face and quickly retracted the “we can make the tires cheaper in Aiken than in China” comment from digital and print sources. But we still have it somewhere. 

After publishing the statement in 2011 in our media properties, I was inundated with interviews and our first story on reshoring made the WSJ, NYT, CNBC, AP, BBC and China Today (English), or the worldwide media itself. I am sure that is when Bridgestone disowned the quote because I used their Aiken project as the “poster child of early reshoring.” 

An even more interesting story regarding Bridgestone and reshoring in general: On March 11, 2011, the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami hit Northeast Japan. That resulted in the worst nuclear accident in world history at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant. (The second-worst nuclear accident worldwide was The Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine in 1986.) An estimated 20,000 people died in the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, shocking the Japanese people.

So was the Japanese disaster six months prior to Bridgestone’s announcement in South Carolina a factor in the manufacturer’s decision to put a whole new plant in Aiken instead of China? Furthermore, was the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami the biggest factor in shorter supply chains or, in short, reshoring? 

That is for you to decide. I have spoken with many logistical experts who also happen to be economists, like Mark Vitner and Dr. Walter Kemmsies, who are also regulars at our SEDR@Rosemary event in December. They found my theory “interesting.” Another member of SEDR and another logistics expert is former SC Ports CEO, Jim Newsome. 

Not once did anyone point to any one thing other than the U.S. becoming more competitive with China as the true cause of reshoring. My intuition tells me that the 2011 disaster had a lot to do with reshoring (and I have written this many times) because at events my manufacturing CEO friends, like the late John Correnti, were saying, “Now, tell me: Why are we making things halfway around the world for consumers here in the U.S.?” Good point. 

Again, the fact that the U.S., specifically the South, has become so competitive with one particular country (China), is what is behind reshoring. Mexico and the South will always be your best locations in terms of overall costs and more labor availability than any other one place in North America. The evolutions of reshoring are more real now than ever. 

Reshoring Initiatives Annual Report

Harry Moser and the Reshoring Initiative’s annual report came out in the spring. After 15 years, Moser seems to now be one of the more accurate sources of reshoring news and data because that is all he does and has been doing it for 15 years to date. 

So, while we cannot publish the Reshoring Initiative’s annual report, here are some highlights:

As you can see, the South commands a near monopoly on reshored and FDI jobs every single year, capturing 60 percent of every dollar invested and job created last year alone. And that was not even the South’s best year in capturing reshored jobs. President Biden’s incentives saw a spike in reshored and FDI jobs in 2022, the best year in 15, according to the Reshoring Initiative. Biden’s incentives are expiring. 

Reshoring Initiative’s Executive
Summary on Reshoring in 2024

“In 2024, U.S. manufacturing reshoring and foreign direct investment (FDI) remained strong, driven by companies seeking to shorten supply chains, reduce exposure to geopolitical risks, and avoid costs associated with impending tariffs. 

“In early 2025, global supply chains are grappling with uncertainty. Data from the Reshoring Initiative offers timely insight into how companies are responding to the changing environment. 

“President Trump’s objective of ‘reindustrialization’ is synonymous with reshoring and FDI. All three processes are essentially import substitution — importing less and producing more.”
– Harry Moser