BLS & Co.'s Michelle Comerford was recently quoted in the Austin Business Journal regarding site selection trends. Link to full article is available here: How will Elon Musk use all this land east of Austin? - Austin Business Journal (bizjournals.com)
***
Michelle Comerford, industrial and supply chain practice leader for Princeton, New Jersey-based site selection firm Biggins Lacy Shapiro and Co., said it’s typical for car manufacturers to buy massive tracts of land in case they need to grow operations in response to demand.
“For an emerging industry that seems to have really strong projections for growth, I could see why they would buy that much land," Comerford said. "And, why not, if you can secure it? You're mitigating risk of not being able to add capacity because of land, and that’s an easy way to protect their technology. It can also be almost a defensive move to say, ‘Our security is going to be really strong here because we're going to have all this buffer that no one can really be around or build around.’"
Michelle Comerford is the Industrial & Supply Chain Practice Leader at Biggins Lacy Shapiro & Co., one of the largest, most highly regarded site selection and incentives advisory firms in North America. BLS & Co. helps manage the complexities associated with finding optimal location and securing incentives to support new ventures. Michelle has recently been published in fDi Magazine, Inbound Logistics, Trade & Industry Development, Supply & Demand Chain Executive, among others.