Struggling Small Business Hangs On

Yesterday offered the opportunity to tour a small struggling textile plant in Shelby. Dicey Fabrics was founded in 1957 but the company has a history that dates back to the Civil War when the current owners family hedged their bets by producing both blue and gray cloth. Over the years the company became a strong business partner to the Cleveland County community as an employer, taxpayer, and generous contributor to many local causes. At its peak it was a multi million dollar company with over 200 employees.

The company produces upholstery for furniture and other similar products for a market in the U.S. (and particularly in North Carolina) that has dramatically diminished over the last few years. The company now employs about 75 workers and operates only one shift in the one story brick facility in the rolling hills of the western piedmont. Overseas trade policies have caused the company's decline and family members wonder if they'll be able to sustain this piece of family and community history.

As I toured the plant with Scott Neisler whose family owns Dicey Fabrics, it was obvious the pride and frustration felt by everyone associated with the company. In a age when huge government subsidies are provided to businesses like Google moving in to the state, little, if anything is done for companies like Dicey Fabrics. I asked about work force preparedness assistance to help provide a higher skilled workforce or tax breaks that might help. Scott's answer was "little to none". The one tax credit that the company had pursued because of its location in a special local tax district turned out to be more harm than help. Having taken a $185,000 tax credit, the company was subsequently told that the district boundaries had been incorrectly drawn and the company didn't qualify. The ensuing tax bill "came at a really bad time for the company" said Neisler.

Another concern was the so-called incentives handed out to certain new companies who had come to the area. Those subsidized jobs only produced greater pressure on Dicey Fabrics to raise its wages in order to compete thus making a tight margin for profit that much tighter.

Dicey Fabrics is a story played out all across North Carolina. While our economic development strategy continues to be to hand out huge tax breaks and grants to the big national and international companies whose profits flow out of state, small local businesses struggle to stay in business. Reform is needed...badly needed, not just in this state but across the country. It's time that small business stood up and was counted and joined our effort to reform a system that not only is broken but poorly reflects the values that our state should represent.