(MOBILE, Ala.) - Big talk from the big man at airbus Friday, as company Chairman Allan McArtor spoke during a luncheon in Birmingham using strong words of reassurance on the impact Airbus will have on Alabama and the Port City.
According to a report from The Birmingham News, McArtor focused on jobs, construction and suppliers, telling the group not only will "Alabama be Airbus' industrial home," but how Mobile will become the "epicenter of commercial activity."
As far as jobs are concerned, the company is already putting feelers out, posting on Twitter Thursday its search to find a Director of Human Resources in Mobile. Also, McArtor estimates as many as 3,600 additional jobs could open during the construction phase alone, the article reported.
"That will fill some of that gap," Mobile Chamber of Commerce Director of Economic Development Claudia Zimmermann told Local 15 news, adding, "Construction jobs are sometimes hard to come by; right now the construction industry is really looking for work so that project is very very important for that industry as well."
When it comes to recruiting suppliers, the article mentioned McArtor predicted the plant's supply chain to stretch well beyond the Gulf Coast, potentially attracting workers from Florida's panhandle, Tennessee and Ohio.
For economic experts, it's a message worth millions. "Our children have a great future in this new industry coming into Mobile, growing the aerospace sector as a whole and becoming the industrial aerospace center of the Gulf Coast," Zimmermann said.
