Carrier to Shutter Israel Factory & Move Production to China

Are there implications for domestic air conditioning production when a manufacturer moves production from a profitable factory to China?

This is from the Jerusalem Post...

Tadiran Carrier, an Israeli manufacturer of air-conditioners, announced Thursday morning it was transferring all production to China, where labor is cheaper. Consequently, some 350 employees of the factory, all over the age of 50, will be fired.

Tadiran Carrier is considered one of the last emblems of locally designed, produced and made products.

The plant, located in Afula, was making profits, but its owner, a US company, decided to move it abroad.

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Union leaders from the factory appeared to take the closing in stride. The head of the local union told the Globes newspaper, "To tell you the truth, if I was the owner, I'd also move production to China, even though the factory is still profitable. Production costs are half as much over there, which adds millions to the profits."

So what does this mean for U.S. production? Probably nothing. The transportation costs for unitary products go a long way towards equalizing any labor and regulatory savings from Chinese production.

Fortunately, no one can transfer service and installation work to China!

Happy Retirement Joe Rettig

Joe Rettig, Residential Sales Manager for the Carrier Division of the Habegger Corporation, is retiring as of July 31. I'll be sad to see him go.

People like Joe make HVAC a great industry. When I think of Joe, I see him at Comfortech, holding court during lunch, surrounded by contractors. By the comments he made, it was obvious that Joe knew every one of them personally and well. He had a relationship.

Joe was old school. He came up through the industry at a time when the relationship between the TM/distributor and contractor was all important. He was very good at developing these relationships. It wasn't phony. These were heartfelt, real, and genuine friendships. These were the type of relationships that bound contractors to Habegger and through Habegger to Carrier and Bryant.

Through the years, I've received a number of notes from Joe about things I wrote or said. I know he didn't agree with everything I wrote, but commented every now and then when he did. He's an authentic nice guy. I wish him well in his retirement, though the industry will miss him.