PINE HILL, Alabama -- It's undisputed that Wilcox County, Alabama, had to be the most unlikely place for a foreign company to invest millions of dollars, building a copper tube manufacturing plant.
But China's Golden Dragon Precise Copper Tubing Group, which had sold products in the U.S. before, chose the Alabama community west of Pine Hill to construct its first factory in the country, an investment of a reported $100 million.
The factory opened in May, with Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley presiding over a ceremony welcoming the firm to one of the most economically challenged corners of the state: "But it's not always going to be the poorest area," he said, "it's going to change."
The firm has figured prominently in Bentley's campaign to win jobs for the state. It was another example that companies could be lured to the South where "right-to-work" laws are the norm, coupled with a reasonably lower cost of doing business.
Fast forward five months and it would seem at least a part of that ethos has been turned on its head. On Nov. 7, a slim majority of the 150 employed at the factory voted to join the United Steelworkers Union. Days before, Bentley had sent the employees what he characterized as a "soft letter," imploring them to vote "no."
A single ballot tilted the election to favor organizing with 75 in favor; 74 against. GD Copper filed objections to the election, the merits of which will be heard by the National Labor Relations Board in Selma next week.
Officials with the federal body that oversees the elections said the nature of those objections cannot be made public. A favorable decision would mean employees can negotiate with the plant's owners on working conditions.
Bentley said he believes the episode could complicate recruitment efforts if things should go awry at the plant. The letter asked the employees to give the company time as management works out the kinks of getting the facility up and running.
"We do live in a right-to-work state and people have the right to unionize if they wish," Bentley said. "I do not think, though, that that is the best way for me to recruit industries into the state of Alabama."
Culture clash
The governor's stance is one that is repeated often when the subject of unions and industry emerge in conversation. But the situation puts a focus on potential culture clashes when a firm comes in from the outside, especially to the Deep South.
GD Copper was welcomed to the state with a generous $42 million package of incentives: $20 million in state economic development discretionary incentives; $8.5 million in property tax abatements; $5.1 million in sales and use tax abatements; $5.7 million for an industrial road and bridge to support the plant; $1.8 million in worker training services; and site purchase, prep and water and sewer improvements worth about $1 million, according to a previous AL.com report.
The bulk of the state's offering were capital income credits worth as much as $160 million over 20 years. GD Copper is just one of the many international employers that have found stateside homes in Alabama, joining steel mill AM/NS Calvert, Airbus, Hyundai and Mercedes-Benz, whose employees recently formed a local United Automobile Workers Union at the plant in Vance.
With so many foreign-owned firms now in the Southeastern U.S., two common forces have developed, says Mike Burnette, a former global supply chain executive at Procter and Gamble and professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville's Haslam College of Business.
Faced with dwindling memberships in the Northeast and Midwest -- both union strongholds -- labor organizers are seeking new territory in the South, Burnette said.
And sometimes "there becomes a trust issue between the employees and the management," he said. "We've also seen this some with foreign companies when they come in their style of management -- in Malaysia, or Indonesia, or China or India -- may be different than the style of management an employee in Alabama or Tennessee may be used to."
'Locally-driven'
At least in one regard, GD Copper was different. "This is not an effort that started in Pittsburgh," -- the home base of the steelworkers union -- "from my understanding this was something that was very much a locally-driven issue," said Thomasville Mayor Sheldon Day, who played a role recruiting the company to the area.
Cultural and language barriers weighed heavily on the plant, Day said, "on both sides" -- the Chinese and local residents. An already complex process, Golden Dragon's use of proprietary methods at the copper tube manufacturing plant meant many of the engineers came from the parent company in China.
"Some of the issues are easily remedied," he said. "It has been a little more of a challenge, and a little more frustrating for some of the employees because of the language barrier and just the newness of the facility."
Still, the unionization couldn't have come at a more inopportune time, Day said. Labor negotiations may not help the communication issues.
"I'm not pro-union or anti-union. I'm pro-worker and pro-job," Day said. "I don't have a problem or a quarrel with unionization at any facility, but in this particular case I don't think the timing has been good because they're just trying to start the plant up."
Other unions
Union activity in the state is not abnormal. In fact, several factories including chemical-maker BASF Corp in McIntosh; International Paper in Pine Hill; and Brazil's Akzonobel in Axis each have unions, according to Daniel Flippo, district 9 director for the United Steelworkers.
"There's actually several unions in the area," Flippo said. "Within a 60- to 70-mile radius, the steelworkers have a good bit of density there."
A number of GD Copper employees easily became interested. A small committee was formed in the spring to discuss how to cement the effort.
Greg Canfield, Alabama's secretary of commerce said he, too, was disappointed with the union vote outcome. In an email, he said ultimately it's the state's "business-friendly climate, skilled workers, first-rate job training programs" that bring in major manufacturers.
GD Copper isn't the first industrial employer to move in that direction, and likely will not be the last.
"Unionization attempts at large Alabama manufacturers are actually nothing new. Unions have launched repeated organizing campaigns at the state's auto assembly plants over the past 20 or so years, but none has succeeded," Canfield said. "We expect there will more campaigns directed at manufacturing companies in the future."
Update: This story was updated on Dec. 7 at 8:56 p.m. to correct that GD Copper USA is not Golden Dragon Precise Copper Tubing Group's first factory on the continent. They also have one in Mexico.