Manufacturing 2.0
Rock River Valley manufacturing experts discuss the many facets of manufacturing: technology, education, training, events, people and any other aspects of this important segment of our economy. They’ll use this blog to get the word out and solicit feedback on local and global manufacturing. They hope to better engage our employers, employees and our future work force and increase their understanding of manufacturing.

Archive for July 22nd, 2008

Recession? A New “Feel Good” Index

6 comments July 22nd, 2008

I’ve recently written about my observations regarding cars and truck traffic on I-90; then I expanded it to include some other factors that I noted regarding the economy, especially the local area. This morning, it occurred to me that there were other notable indicators that would indicate to me that our local economy is in better shape than we see in the media. So I’ve developed an unscientific approach and will call it the “Feel Good” Index. Here’s what I’ve seen and what’s been reported:

1. Car and Truck traffic….heavy on a sample of three different days and times.

2. Movie Box Office receipts…a record last weekend; both Showcase 16’s sold out on Friday.

3. Retail sales seem to be holding up, e.g. Starbucks, Best Buy still busy and reports from the IMF that say the consumer is still spending.  Oh, yes, they also said that the rebate checks are working.  Funny, I didn’t see this on national TV.

4. Local Tourism spending in 2007 is 5% ahead of 2006. It was the highest since the 2001 attacks. With the floods causing closure of SportsCore I, it may be difficult to predict revenues in 2008 on a comparable basis, but the trend was right.

5. Air traffic at the Rockford airport; slightly down from 2007 in June: 18,044 in ‘08 and 18,290 in ‘07…but +16% ahead of last year on a Year to Date basis.   Let’s see, that means the roads and air fields must be crowded?

6. Record sales and profits for Apple.  Boy, do we love to buy those iPods and iPhone 3G’s!! I guess we call these things “necessities of life” nowadays.

Now to figure out how to make a number out of these!

I’m sure my index won’t earn me a Noble Peace Prize for technical brilliance, but maybe we can develop this idea further and stop wringing our hands at all the negative headlines!!  Manufacturers have enough to worry about.