Gregg Robinson

Greg Robinson, thanks for hanging out with me today. Absolutely, it's a pleasure. Well, it is, uh, it's good to see you, good to have you in town. I know that, uh, yeah, one of the interesting things, one of the reasons that, that I originally started doing this was because I had somebody ask one time. I know that you've, I'm sure, been to Victor's, and if you go on the wrong day, it's— well, I say it depends on what who you ask as to whether or not it's the wrong day. But if you go on Rotary Day, all of Florence comes by. And so I was with a friend of mine from out of town, and they said, man, you know a lot of people, you know, because folks around here are kind and they speak. And, uh, and he said, but do you really know all these people? And so for me, this is kind of a passion project to just get to know folks. So far it has been folks from around town, but I'm excited because, uh, because you're new. So For anybody who doesn't know, me included, who is Greg Robinson?

That's an interesting question and not easy to answer, but a simple guy who wants to try and make a difference, you know, just one project at a time and one deal at a time and trying to leave things better than I found them.

That's awesome. Well, so one of the ways that you're going to do that is you're the CEO of Progress, am I right? Correct. And so, Partnership. Partnership, excuse me, I get that confused.

Yeah, you know what?

So what's the difference?

Well, so, well, they are hand in glove. So the Partnership is the governmental arm, it's the outside agency that represents economic development for the county. And Progress is the private sector arm that helps fund the public sector arm. And there are certain things that we want to use taxpayer dollars for, i.e., infrastructure and key elements, being good stewards of the dollar. And then on the progress side, where the private sector, we can be a little bit more nimble. We have a little bit less strings and a little bit less bureaucracy when we need to make things happen. And so that is a nice element of this organization, is it has a blend of both. Among the 46 counties in our state, there are 46 in South Carolina, every county is different.. Some have commissions, some have boards, some have partnerships, some are just governmental agencies, some use the chamber. So it is all different across all 46 and really across the entire Southeast. You'll see a different chef in the kitchen. And I like to use that analogy because some restaurants do really well and some don't, and it's usually because of the chef. And so that's leadership, and that's, uh, that's one of the reasons why I was drawn to, to this area in general.

Now, uh, being drawn to this here, where, where did you Where did you come from?

So how did you get here? I am originally from the Pee Dee. I was born in Kingstree, South Carolina. My whole family is from Williamsburg County, but my father was down in Hilton Head in the mid-'60s, late '60s in developing Hilton Head. So he was part of a team that developed Palmetto Dunes. Okay. And then went out on his own and residential developed primarily. He did some commercial, but predominantly in residential. And so I literally lived in Hilton my whole life. Hilton Head didn't have a hospital. So a lot of times people don't realize that. So when it was a sea island, I mean, one stoplight, I saw the first general store, I saw the first restaurant. Wow.

And so from Hilton Head then, you know, you obviously kind of made your path. How did you end up in economic development?

So, great question and kind of a unique path. Both my brother and I are in industrial development. So being from Hilton Head, there wasn't a lot of industry down in Beaufort County. Unfortunately, it still isn't. So when I left and went to college and then went off to Georgetown University, then came back for grad school, I was a city manager for— town administrator, quite honestly. I don't want to give it too much because it was a small town. I was 23. And wonderful place called Springdale, South Carolina. I love those people over there, and they gave me a great opportunity. All politics is local. That's a Tip O'Neill quote. I'm not stealing that, but I'll give him credit because it is. And just like on any deal, if we're going to win it, it's going to come at the local level. And so, you know, it's great to get federal and state help, but ultimately it's a decision that's made locally. But to get back to the question, I was a city manager, so a town administrator, and then from there I could go the path of administration, but I had an opportunity with the Department of Commerce. And so the Department of Commerce, we had an industrial park out in Lexington County near Springdale, part of the park was in Springdale. So I was introduced to the Department of Commerce and then ultimately was there for 7, almost 7 years. I was in the international Global Business Development Division and 2 different governors and almost 3. And so it was a very unique time. My boss at the time, who was Director of Global Business Development, was also from the PD. Great guy and kind of mentored a number of young economic developers that still do industrial development today.

Wow. And so Why Florence?

So I've always, I've always been fond of Florence. I have deep roots with family from Williamsburg. We also have very close friends. My father were very close friends with the Stokes family here. Stokes Eye Clinic. Wonderful people. The Davis family. Again, that medical draw, right? I mean, it's, it's, you get some such quality people being a healthcare hub. Absolutely. And so I literally grew up coming to Florence holidays or events or different things. I have a number of dear buddies that are from this area that I met in college, and Joe and I were colleagues and friendly competitors, but at the same time could pick up the phone and kind of compare notes and be honest and genuine with one another. He has an unbelievable kind of history here in Florence and what they've done. I left Commerce and went to Orangeburg County in 2005. We had 4 industrial parks, and when I left on the 11th, we had 11. So I like growing product. They owned or controlled a little over 3,000 acres, and so what my goal would be is to try and grow our foundation of industrial parks. We've done a great job in building some, We got to get those to a level where we can go vertical, and it's all about speed to market.

Well, it's interesting because you mentioned Joe, and I feel like I would have to hope maybe that some of the success that they had would be part of the draw, because again, I, I feel like your team has been successful up until this point Yeah, always room for improvement. I'm interested, when you say go vertical, what do you mean?

Vertical is just vertical construction. So like right now we're in the process, and I got to commend County Council, and this is another reason why I was attracted to Florence, is the pro-business nature. They passed a $22 million industrial development bond to get to that next level. You can't do it without money. Amen. And so with that being said, they acquired two real key pieces of property, right? We need to do more. So the idea is to take those two, very similar to what PD Commerce Center was. Now it's going to be PD Commerce Center East and West, and what the utility is doing. Of course, work with those utilities just like we work with ourselves. We represent County Council on all the fee-in-lieu transactions and all the tax incentives. Everything must go through County Council. So if they are to receive any kind of incentive, now they can come without an incentive, but very rarely do you do that.

Yeah, it'd be nice.

It would be nice if they just came.

It'd be nice. Yeah. Well, that's exciting to know that you're going to have East and West.

And let's not forget about the South. I mean, we're looking at Pamblico, we're looking at Lake City, we're looking at Johnsonville. So from East to West, North to South, the idea is to an industrial answer, a commerce answer, so that people don't have to travel for a job. The point is, let's build it in these networks. Let's go after things that work. If Nanya Plastics can be on the border of Orangeburg— excuse me, of Williamsburg and Florence— you can place another Nanya Plastics for sure. So we have to target those that are successful. If, if we are capable of delivering wood-related timber-oriented projects in the South, we should be able to knock on the doors and go after some wood-related timber projects as what I call low-hanging fruit. Sure. Um, it's all about creating the infrastructure. It's all about getting the water, the sewer, the gas, the electricity, but the most important one in the last decade has been broadband. And so we got to get the telecom, we have to get the Wi-Fi, because if we don't have it, the site's pretty much irrelevant. And so we have to make all these sites relevant. If it doesn't have wastewater, if there's no way of getting wastewater, well, don't knock on the door of a process, right? You got to go after dry goods, warehousing, distribution where it's just domestic. So you can get by with some elements where they're not there, but you got to target those elements. And that's what we'll do in the South because we have limited resources. Now, the city of Florence We're very fortunate. I have been exceedingly pleased with the utility department, the water and sewer, the delivery. It's the reason why you have the Pepsi plant, the water plant, and some of those key elements, because we have quality infrastructure that's here. And so for those projects that require half a million or a million gallons a day, and we're seeing more and more of those— put your head around that, a pool is about 10,000 gallons, so it's a lot of pools. In one day. So it's, it's having the ability to deliver that infrastructure is only a handful of locations in the entire state.

Well, I know we're definitely, it sounds like, lucky in that regard. And I'm with you, both city and county council, any experience I've had with them, they've been really good to work with. I would like to specifically advocate for Pamplaco. That's where I'm from. I'm a Raider.

I was getting ready to ask you.

Yeah, I'm Where do you hail from? Anything you can do in Pamplaco makes me happy.

I just spoke to the school district, was down there, and Roger Poston got me down. I like him. He's sharp. And we're evaluating right now what can we do to again create an industrial opportunity down there. What can we do to kind of market that area? Because we've got to grow it. They've lost a little bit of this last census, which we can go into. I've kind of challenged some of those census numbers. I mean, it came at the worst time. I mean, absolute worst time. And I think that we had areas across the state that saw dips, and there's no way they're dipping. I mean, here, for example, you can't have that many new housing starts, and you can't have that many new building permits. And have a declining census. It's just, it's counterintuitive. It's counterintuitive, it really is. It just doesn't make sense.

So with the, the different parts, I'm curious, one of the things, and I don't know that I'll use the correct terminology, one of the things that I had somebody in industry talk to me about one time is what I'll call kind of hubs. Yeah. So if you, if you were, like you said, if you have a Nanoplastics somewhere whether it is supporting businesses or other similar businesses.

Is that kind of the philosophy that you'd use to try to fill up the parks? There is no doubt that industry cluster, and they cluster because of raw materials and finished goods, and also because electricity or wherever it makes sense. You know, we kind of chuckle when you get Home Depot, you get Lowe's, or you know, you get one grocery store, you get the other grocery store.

Walgreens and CVS.

Perfect example.. So it's traffic patterns in their particular case, right? You know, McDonald's, Burger King, they all follow each other. It's these paths that you have to. And so if I were to kind of simplify the process, I would simplify it in logistics, workforce, because again, those are critical things that are constant. And then the last one's utilities. So those are constant costs to a company. So if you have excellent logistics, all right, so you're knocking down that raw material coming in, finished good going out. If you have the workforce that is a certain skill set and you know that it's plentiful and you have access to it, that is a variable that changes as far as wage, but the density of it does not. And then the third one on utilities is, are they reliable and are they redundant? And do you have capacity? So if you have all three of those, then those individuals, companies, say it's timber, go plastics, go automotive, go Aerospace, they cluster because they all need the same stuff. Gotcha. No different than what the commercial's doing on traffic patterns.

Makes sense. I had never thought about it that way, because, and again, a great example you gave was the water facility and how much water it takes and why, you know, again, a company like Pepsi would be attracted is, I mean, it certainly makes sense that others would be because to your point—

There's only so many places certain projects can go. So a lot of times people go, well, why isn't it over here? Well, there's a reason. There's a reason. So, and you know, why is a company, you know, in a remote area but we can't get— it's because of the raw materials. It could be the availability of the Pine Belt. It could be, for example, in my last job we recruited a peanut shelling operation, and it had a lot to do with the peanut availability, right? So that's that logistics issue trumped a lot of the other issues. And so as a result of that, we placed it in a location that had interstate access but then had access to those farms. So we kind of did a demographic analysis of where they're located and where they needed to be.

So what's your philosophy? How do you go out and recruit?

So again, it depends on what cluster you're trying to target. Not every area is the same. So I tell people, you know, I'd love to be able to go after the the worldwide headquarters of Google. I mean, that's not realistic for South Carolina, right? So where we have had success is where you knock on the door. That's fundamental. That's that low-hanging fruit. But then because of our emerging market, what we are doing downtown, what we have been able to accomplish in the last decade has kind of elevated our opportunities. So now we can start targeting a little bit more sophisticated process. So we can go after regional headquarters. We can go after the manufacturing from a regional perspective where they can place their executives here. So those are a little bit different than just going after your warehousing, your logistics, and your simple pick and pack. We need those too. Sure. But now we have the ability as a market center to draw on something that's a little bit higher quality. And so targeting automotive, targeting aerospace, because I feel they will eventually come back, and when they come back out of COVID it's going to be phenomenal. Because we will travel again. Yeah, it's just delayed. Um, we're seeing disruptions on this EV, you know, these electric vehicles, for sure. Uh, and that is not changing. So we need to target any and everything that we can get our hands on that way. Now, plastics— going after other— we had DuPont. So we— there are reasons why. So we can target plastics, but one of the things that I'm going to really concentrate on is medical devices. And other medical applications. Number one, we're a medical hub, and we have the lifestyle that can handle that level of professional. But it's also because of our location along I-95 and I-20. When you can go to Mid-Texas on I-20 and never stop, right, and you can go all the way to New York and Miami, that's a pretty unique thing. So I want to brand— we don't know what the brand is, but we've got to brand Florence as— and that's part of that marketing. So if you break it in again, logistics, you know, you go with labor, you go with the prospects, how you generate it, but that— how do you brand yourself? And how does the chamber brand with the economic development? How does the hospital brand with economic development? When you kind of look at a decision matrix, whether you make it as moving into a neighborhood or CEO's making it to go into an area, everybody goes through their little checklist. You know, for sure, for a residential area, it may be school districts. For, for a CEO, it's about raw materials or proximity to their supplier, right?

Right. Or workforce.

Workforce, definitely workforce, especially in this market. So those are all things that kind of go into this matrix of decision. Heck, it could be that they're getting close to the beach house. I mean, you never know what drives someone. Sometimes I had, I had a project one time And after about 15 visits, come to find out the CEO's wife was from South Carolina. And it was being driven by—

I guarantee you.

Yeah.

Mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.

So I was like, man, I had this thing and didn't even realize it. So, you know, those are little things that, you know, kind of fun in the cycle of sales.

I got to think you talk about, yeah, after so many visits finding out that The wife was from South Carolina. I gotta imagine a lot of what you do is a relationship business.

It is not a simple sales, quick sales. It's a 9-month to a year sales cycle. It is a lot of diligence. Now, can it be advanced? Yes. If, for example, Honda tells its supplier they want them within 10 miles, that's easy. That's a fast sales cycle. But if they truly can be within 150 miles of Boeing or Honda Aviation up in Greensboro, or just name any kind of major OEM, you know, be within a half a day, right, then it opens it up. And that's where they do deep dives. And just like, for example, since I've been here, we've had consultants that are trying to learn more. They want to come down, they want touch, feel, see before they even bring their client.

What do you think might be the biggest draw in terms of— you mentioned we have the kind of lifestyle.

That is the kind of— I think the lifestyle is the kind of icing on the cake. The cake foundation, you know, making the cake is can you deliver the utilities? Do you have the workforce? Do you have the site? Do you control the site? Is the site available to go vertical within a reasonable timeframe? If you do not say yes out of the gate, you're not even making a second visit.

Gotcha. Yeah, well, I can see that because I would have to think these folks, by the time they get to you, it's, it's been 9 months or a year or forever for them to be thinking about it. By the time they get to you, they were on the 20-yard line even though you're just getting started.

And well said. We kind of chart it from when we have prospects that it's either a lead or a suspect, and that's someone that we're talking to, someone that you've met at a conference or at a trade show, or it could be that they've just called in just kind of getting information. That just becomes a suspect. When they become a prospect is when they start spending money to come visit, right? Boots on the ground, for sure. And so that means that if they're going to come and put themselves up in a hotel and look around and get some deeper dive, want to meet with folks like you and others, that's different. That kind of elevates that site search. And so that's part of that.

Yeah, I can see that. It's, it's a lot like that in our business. We've, we've had the good fortune to expand outside of Florence and to be able to do some recruiting. And a big part of that, uh, understanding the level of commitment of the other person is having them do a home office visit to come here. And you can certainly feel a lot better. Again, nothing's ever certain, but number one, you feel good if you live in Florence to be able to bring them down here, you know, in downtown, uh, and be able to take them out to dinner or have them stay at Hotel Florence or So, yeah, I feel like we've created a good environment, but on top of that, you know, that there's a level of commitment on their part to be willing to travel, in our case, depending on where they're coming from, potentially, you know, run the risk of, you know, because I know that all y'all's projects are top secret. You can imagine a financial advisor changing firms, not something you want to make super public. I mean, you know, you're exposing yourself. To some cost and some risk, and it really makes you feel like there is some skin in the game on the other side.

Exactly. And even though they may be evaluating 3 or 4 locations, you know that it's real in the sense they wouldn't be spending money, time, and resources if it wasn't.

Yeah, it doesn't, it doesn't cost anything to swap emails or watch videos. It makes a big difference when, like you say, they put the boots on the ground. But I also think that's where those of us who are doing any kind of recruitment or sales, if you will, is that's where we have an opportunity to really show it off. Yeah, you know, I mean, we've got a lot of great stuff here, a lot of great videographers and photographers, but nothing says it like being able to put them, you know, a shovel in the dirt or walk around a site. And a big part of that, I got to think, is just getting to the place where they actually— where you're getting them here.

And I was talking with both hospitals and their recruitment of key personnel, right? No different. Just like we just talked about, those are key things too. That's why gateways are so important. And what the city and the county have accomplished on I-20 and I-95 needs to be duplicated as best we can on every exit. You know, if I were to look at key areas and arteries of beautification, Five Points is one of them. To kind of clean that up, take that lighting underground. Those are things that need to be a high priority. But as you kind of even go out towards the interstates from Exit 170, 164, I mean, you've got some great opportunities right there at 164, which is Highway 52, to help those hotels improve. There's no reason we can't create a policy or kind of an incentive that offers them an opportunity to clean those hotels up and make them better.

Sure, well, and again, it's interesting. Of course, this is what you do for a living, so one would expect, but you know, I hadn't really— to some extent, because I live toward the exit of 95 and 76. I don't remember what the—

157.

Yep, and so, yeah, I live over in that direction, and you often think. Now, now they— Bruce Lee is doing some work out there with, I think it's a soccer complex and some things like that. But you, you have to— it's hard not to think that there's a lot more opportunity, even though I admit to the fact that I never necessarily thought of it being maybe quite as extensive. You've got a bigger vision than I do for that because I just—

I tell everyone that we talk to When you go home, look at it again as if the first time you've ever seen your neighborhood. You know, it could be a La-Z-Boy sitting on the corner of the road that somebody dumped off. You can get it. You can fix it. You can call and get it picked up. If there's a crooked street sign, call on it. These are tiny things. Everyone can make a difference in this process of making their neighborhood better. We just get kind of numb to it. Into it, right? But there's no reason that we can't— every individual has the ability to improve it a little bit. And if we do that, then the attention that comes in off of that, let me tell you, the prospects notice it big time. And I will say this, I'm a big believer, if I've got to show a piece of property at 8 o'clock, I'm driving it at 7.

Yeah.

Yeah. I'm not going to go out there and see it for the first time with them. Right. And because you never know. I mean, God forbid an animal get hit.

Sure.

That's bad mojo.

Yeah, yeah.

And I've had that happen, by the way. That's kind of a—

that's how you learn that.

That's how you learn that one right there. Uh, yeah, you got to call animal control real quick.

Yeah, well, or throw them in the back of your pickup truck. I mean, you know, I mean, it depends on the size.

Or call a buddy.

Yeah, exactly. Well, and again, I think it's interesting, again, just listening to you and thinking about kind of that stretch of 95 that we're talking about.

And even coming into Florence County, having the signs not great. I mean, there's all kinds of little tiny details.

Yeah, well, I'm just thinking about— so I take 95 and go down towards Charleston, or you may switch over, I guess, at some point to 26. But you think about all of the different— because when I think of, you know, the mall area, the intersection and 95 and 20, and how how busy that is. But when I think back to some of these other places, every— it's not a mall, but every stop along the interstate is grown up over a period of time.

And so it's a destination, no question.

I would think that that gives us a lot of opportunity because I would think that a lot of the places that we're talking about are either undeveloped or underdeveloped.

Yeah, and, and Again, it goes with infrastructure. So when you're driving next time down 95 to 26 and you see these key exits, if there's nothing there, it's because they don't have water and sewer. Gotcha. And they may end up having a small little gas station or something that's a well and septic, but that's been there a long time.

It's not new. Yeah, and I don't stop. Yeah. Yeah, it's one of those things that if you're trying to get people, you kind of pay attention. Right, and if you know there's— if you've ever stopped and there was a bad experience, or it's not taken care of, or if you, you just notice there aren't very many things there, you kind of figure that what is there isn't necessarily going to be the quality that you want.

It's usually you got a loose tire or something, you know, flat tire or something going on, right?

It'd have to be bad, you know.

And I, and I use, uh, I've mentioned this to others too, I've said, uh, If you're traveling, meaning just you and your own business, eh, I can sleep anywhere for a night and move on.

Got the family, totally different ballgame.

Absolutely. And so safety becomes paramount. Lighting, accessibility, in and out. You've almost done a little homework on your stops. And so when these folks are coming from New York to Miami, They know where they're going and where they're going to stop and what they're going to do. They're not just free-flowing it, especially with a family. So, you know, not pulling off at an exit and, "Hey, find us a hotel." Hope it works out. Yeah, hope it works out. No, you're not doing that. So again, with all of those strategic initiatives, it kind of does play right into that psyche of the prospect coming in too.

Yeah, for sure. Well, listen, I'm excited about you getting out in the community. I've learned a lot already. And look forward to, to really picking your brains more. I've learned a lot just in our, you know, 30 minutes together, uh, if nothing else, to look at things a different way. Yeah. So that, that's been a big, um, a big plus. I'm excited. So one last question, uh, I'm curious, uh, because I'm a people person, so I like to, to kind of understand. It's— and it's interesting, the, the answers that I get. So if If Greg could pick one fictional character, it could be a superhero, it could be a comic book, a book, a movie, if you could pick one fictional character that you think best represents you, who would it be and why?

That is a difficult question. I guess just because speed to market, I'll go with The Flash.

I like it.

You've got to be fast. I've already been back to the office and back.

It's good to hear because, you know, I think that anytime you transition administrations, if you want to call it that, or leaders, um, yeah, one of the things that, that at least for me when we enter a new market is you'd love to have a quick win. So speed to market is certainly something that it'll be a, it'll be a good trait to have. I'm glad to have The Flash on board.

Well, thank you, man. It's good to be here. Thank you for taking the time. I'd love to learn more about, about you too, and whenever you— on the podcast or off?

We'll do it off the podcast. I'll let you turn it around on the podcast with me a different time, but I'm excited to have you.

Sounds good.

Thanks.