From textiles to trinkets to the packaging of your favorite treats, Baton Rouge businesses in a variety of industries continue to feel the ripple effect of labor strife on the West Coast, which has been upsetting the global supply chain for months.
As a Business Report feature from the current issue details, first it was Mardi Gras beads. Then it was another one of Louisiana’s treasures, coffee. Now the state’s economic backbone, industry, is caught in the crosshairs of this far-flung problem largely out of local business owners’ control.
And although longshoremen are at back at work under the terms of a tentative agreement reached in February and container congestion slowly is getting unclogged at the ports, many industries still are waiting for their supply chains to return to normal.
Jonathan Gold, vice president of supply chain and customs policy for the National Retail Federation, says the impact of the backlog can be felt across the board.
“Everything from retail to manufacturing to agriculture,” Gold says. “Everything was hit by this.”
In the Capital Region, a growing number of businesses are making do with what they can acquire and absorbing additional costs incurred by the delays caused by vessels that are anchored offshore, waiting to get into West Coast ports. Congestion issues also remain in transporting goods out of ports because of the sheer volume of containers piled up in them.
Lewco Specialty Products, which provides high-temperature, chemically resistant textiles for industrial users, has experienced significant delays. Headquartered in Baton Rouge, the company has one container of materials that has been sitting for six weeks on the West Coast. Lewco President Lewis Dill says he still does not know when it can be transported, which is causing big headaches for his company.
Similarly, PacTec—an international manufacturer of packaging, filtration and spill containment for hazardous radioactive and nuclear waste businesses with a distribution and manufacturing location in Clinton—is experiencing significant production and cost issues since the strikes.
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