Manufacturing Economy

On September 8th, 2011, MFG.com participated in the NTMA Purchasing Fair in Chicago, IL. The event was held at the Intercontinental Hotel at O'Hare, and was considered a huge success on many levels.

Beginning in the first quarter of 2011, MFG.com expanded its MFGWatch Quarterly Survey of North American Manufacturers to include manufacturers from Europe, the Middle East & Africa (EMEA). The survey was conducted from the MFG.com Paris office, and the second quarterly survey for that region was just completed.

In the latest MFGWatch Quarterly Survey of North American Manufacturers, conducted by MFG.com, encouraging activity in the second quarter of 2011 was mixed with trepidation for the last half of the year, as economic concerns have all manufacturers in a collective 'wait and see' mode.

Join us tomorrow, Wednesday August 24th from 2:00 - 3:00pm for a free webinar hosted by MFG.com called "To Offshore or Reshore? How to Objectively Decide".

Recent reports by Boston Consulting and Accenture call for substantial amounts of offshored manufacturing to come back to the U.S. by 2015 due to the rising offshore wages and currency appreciation.

The reshoring movement - repatriating production back to the US from overseas - is gaining steam.

In a piece produced and posted by Reuters Insider, and using data collected in a joint survey by MFG.com and Reuters, the reshoring trend is examined and discussed by CEOs, shop floor workers, economists and journalists.

More North American buy-side manufacturers report they've experienced "a significant supply chain disruption" in the first quarter of 2011. In the latest MFGWatch Survey, 42% of manufacturers say those disruptions were serious enough to require looking for or actually selecting alternative sources of supply.

In the latest MFGWatch Survey of North American Manufacturers, both buyers and suppliers say they are seeing moderate increases in activity - like inquiries for new work and business conditions - the overall response shows a cooling off from the dramatic growth seen in the last quarter of 2010. A combination of rising costs & inflation, economic uncertainty and the Japanese tragedy seemed to be slowing growth.

Mitch Free, MFG.com founder & CEO appears on CNBC’s Small Business Council to discuss optimism in small businesses.

Mitch Free: "I'm actually more optimistic... In the customer base that we have with mfg.com, which is small manufacturing companies in America, job shops, where the rubber meets the road, what we're hearing, and what we're seeing in the marketplace is that these guys are [optimistic]..."

Mitch Free, founder & CEO of MFG.com, appeared on Fox Business News' Small Business Spotlight to discuss the value of manufacturing marketplaces, the opportunities for manufacturing on the Internet, how entrepreneurs and suppliers' businesses are served by MFG.com, reshoring production to the US, and the role of MFG.com in enabling commerce between various manufacturers.

Oh, and he's wearing a tie - which is really unusual, if you know Mitch.

Hi Everyone! Check out a Press Release (below) that is going out today. We here at MFG.com are deeply saddened by the recent catastrophe in Japan. We are doing what we can to help today by opening up our marketplace of qualified, rated and with capacity Suppliers to those companies whose Supply Chain has been devastated by this disaster in an effort to mitigate the disruption and help them find new immediate sources of supply. Spread the word folks.