Vessels coming to local port to get even larger

The next generation of gargantuan container ships should be on the local horizon in the not-so-distant future.

So said new port chief Jim Newsome while speaking last week before a standing-room only meeting of the Charleston Trident Realtors Association's Commercial Investment Division.

Newsome's source for this projection is his chief sales lieutenant, Paul McClintock , who recently returned from meetings in Asia with customers who own vessels that can haul the equivalent of 8,000 20-foot-long containers, or TEUs.

To date, the largest cargo ships that have tied up at the Port of Charleston can carry about 6,500 TEUs.

Newsome said McClintock returned from his Far East trip with a clear message: These larger vessels will come calling on the Holy City 'sooner rather than later' — and long before the 2014 completion of the Panama Canal widening project. 'I predict we'll see 8,000-TEU ships in Charleston next year,' Newsome stated.

Inside sales

Talk about getting inside your customer's head.

Bruce Murdy, president of Charleston advertising and marketing firm Rawle Murdy Associates Inc.

this year struck a highly unusual bargain with a major client, the supermarket chain Piggly Wiggly Carolina Co, Inc. He agreed to divide his time for six months platooning between his day job and the Pig's internal team as the locally based grocer restructured its marketing department.

Looking to lift sales and fill the void left by the departure of its marketing chief earlier this year, Piggly Wiggly asked Murdy, whose firm has handled that account for 22 years, to serve as its interim marketing director until replacement Christopher Ibsen came on board in September.

Murdy found a staff that didn't know what people in other departments were doing. They weren't used to sharing information between ad, research and internal communication divisions. No one had accepted responsibility for the chain's Web site and e-mail marketing. 'The biggest challenge I had was changing culture,' Murdy told the trade publication Advertising Age recently.

What did he do about it? He installed a digital marketing head, moved people around, asked staff for ideas that could be implemented right away, patched communication between marketing and management and reworked the grocer's media strategy by moving back to mass-media channels, including TV. Sales began to increase.

Piggly Wiggly CEO David Schools doesn't recommend the ad-coach arrangement for everyone, but he said it worked because it was based on trust from many years of working together.

The Horsey's patootie

Online bickering between Boeing Co. supporters on either coast is nothing new, but the debate doesn't seem to have calmed since company officials announced they plan to build a second

787 Dreamliner assembly line in North Charleston. Last week, Seattle Post-Intelligencer editorial cartoonist David Horsey stoked the flames some more with a panel showing five South Carolina workers struggling to piece together the plane. Go to www.postandcourier.com/boeing to see the Horsey's talent for stereotyping.

The cartoon was deemed so offensive within Boeing's upper echelon that it prompted a response from the aerospace giant, which said it was 'deeply disappointed' with its depiction.

'Regardless of any level of local disappointment in Seattle with the decision, it is simply out of line to suggest that the men and women of The Boeing Co. — no matter where they are based — would perform their professional duties at anything less than the highest standards of quality and safety,' the company said in a statement.

The company went on to defend its South Carolina work force. 'Our team in South Carolina is educated, dedicated and hard working. The SC facility is modern and productive.

Airplanes produced in South Carolina will conform to the Boeing production standards, meet all industry regulations and be indistinguishable from those built in Everett.'

Climate change

The Palmetto State has climbed a few notches in a specialty publication's annual rankings of states with the most favorable business climates. According to Site Selection, a magazine geared at industrial recruiters, South Carolina moved to sixth place for 2009, from 10th last year.

The magazine said it determines the annual rankings by analyzing new and expanded business activity and by surveying site selectors, who can wield enormous influence in deciding where companies invest.

North Carolina topped the list for the fifth straight year, The State newspaper reported last week.