As the U.S. market continues to struggle, U.S. based businesses that previously never considered other markets are being forced to look outside their immediate market to survive. Even along border towns in the U.S. many businesses never saw a reason to look to the north in Canada to do business. Why should they? Business was good in the U.S. and besides it seemed like every Canadian business was trying to get into the U.S. market. Times are different. The U.S. continues to slow and many markets in Canada, especially the west coast, are thriving.
One example is Bellingham Washington based Credo Construction Inc. I have noticed advertising in B.C. for Credo Construction Inc. and knew that name from when I lived in Washington. In the case of Credo Construction there is a tie back to B.C. Todd Lapinsky of Credo Construction formerly operated B.C. based Lapinsky Construction before moving to Bellingham. So are B.C. based businesses that have moved their operations to the U.S. having second thoughts? I think it depends on the type of business. In the case of a construction company like Credo Construction, having the ability to work on both sides of the border offeres a lot of diversification and hedges your risk. For a manufacturing company, the U.S. is still a much larger market then Canada and offers more opportunity for growth. It is interesting to see U.S. companies, and even former B.C. based companies that have moved to the U.S., now looking back to the strong economy in Canada as the better place to be right now.
