Jacksonville's campaign to grab global trade continues

Jacksonville Business Journal - by Mark Szakonyi Staff Writer

Before international companies can come to Jacksonville, they have to know it exists.

It has taken a more than decade-long campaign involving briefing foreign consulates and hosting trade missions and visiting international executives for Jacksonville to grab the attention of global companies that used to think the only cities in Florida were Miami and Orlando.

The ongoing push, which has attracted heavyweights such as Deutsche Bank, Saft America Inc. and Mitsui O.S.K. Lines Ltd., runs parallel to the statewide move to attract more foreign investment and make Florida a logistics and trade center, said Manny Mencia, senior vice president of international business development for Enterprise Florida, the state’s economic development organization.

“Jacksonville has emerged as the state’s third major international hub, along with South Florida and Orlando-Tampa,” Mencia said. “When I go around the state to economic development committees, I point to Jacksonville as a community that really has its act together.”

The ramp-up was helped largely by the Cornerstone Regional Development Partnership’s decision in 2007 to focus its efforts on attracting foreign direct investment. Cornerstone’s briefing of foreign consulates in Miami led the group to host its own seminars for consulates and business delegations from various countries, including the United Kingdom, Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland and Italy, said Michael Breen, director of international development for Cornerstone, the Jacksonville Regional Chamber of Commerce’s economic development arm.

The group has also hosted foreign journalists who then return to their home countries to write stories about Jacksonville’s burgeoning port and aviation industries. The campaign will continue in the spring with the hosting of consulates and trade commissioners from Germany, Canada, Spain and the U.K.

But establishing relations with foreign countries in the hope that businesses will follow isn’t done by Cornerstone alone.

The Jacksonville Sister Cities Association hosted a delegation from its sister city Nantes, France, earlier this month. One of the delegation’s main goals was understanding how the Jacksonville Port Authority operates as a landlord by letting tenants handle dock operations instead of the authority getting involved.

Delegates were especially interested in creating a direct shipping service between their Nantes-Saint Nazaire terminals, which form Europe’s second largest port, and Jacksonville’s port, said Francis Boyer, president of the Committee of Nantes-Jacksonville.

The authority and Nantes representatives plan to make a case to Mediterranean Shipping Co. and CMA-CGM that there is enough potential traffic between the two ports to warrant a direct service, said Robert Peek, the authority’s director of marketing development.

The authority regularly visits international shipping companies and their customers to let them know that, with its Asian and European container service, Jacksonville is no longer just a Caribbean and South American trade hub. A port official working out of South Korea markets the port to Asian shipping companies, too.

The Jacksonville Sister Cities Association has also strengthened relations between the city and San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Curitiba, Brazil.

The signing of a sister city agreement with San Juan helped the Jacksonville Aviation Authority show potential airlines that there is enough business to support direct flights from Jacksonville to the territory. The authority hopes to gain direct service to San Juan by the end of the year, said Steven Grossman, executive director of the Jacksonville Aviation Authority.

The signing of a similar agreement with Curitiba helped lay the groundwork for the Brazil-Jacksonville Alliance of Northeast Florida’s trade mission to the southern Brazilian city in March.

Enterprise Florida continues to market Jacksonville to foreign companies but it has taken a less direct approach in recent years as local agencies build their own international relationships, Mencia said. The organization still gets involved, as when it and the U.S. Commercial Service last year hosted a delegation of African businessmen looking to buy used heavy equipment from Jacksonville dealers.

Jacksonville often underestimates the international strides it has made, Mencia said. The tendency is to think competitors are ahead, but Jacksonville is on an equal footing with more well-known international centers such as Miami.

“When they look at major international hubs in the South,” Mencia said, “Jacksonville will have to be taken into consideration.”