Skilled RV workers.

We don't have an auto industry? You might want to look around. It's just not in MI anymore with the unions acting like they own the place. Nearly every foreign manufacturer has plants here...........all in the south where things are booming. Now Ford is building a giant new plant in Mexico, GM and FCA are already there. Toyota, Honda, and many others still have their high quality with American workers, so why can't the domestics do the same thing? One word..........UAW. It's all about the money.

jplante4 wrote:

3oaks wrote:

jplante4 wrote:
There's a limit to the size of the market for high end campers and motor homes. That limit is set by the number of people who can afford it. In order to grow your business, you need to stop catering only to the well-to-do and produce a product that can be obtained by middle class consumers, who have a wide range of choices on what to do with their disposable income. While Thurston Howell III will nickel and dime you over quality, penny wise consumers are only worried about price and bang for the buck. This explains the current state of the airline industry, and the same complaints are happening there. People pick flights by price only, then complain about the lack of leg room.

Manufacturers have no choice but to cut corners. They can't cut energy costs, taxes or cost of some materials (everyone pays the same for a Freightliner chassis). The only way to cut employee costs is to let people go, and when you do that you cut capacity, making things worse. Quality of material and craftsmanship are easy things to cut. It would happen in the airline industry if the FAA hadn't set at least minimum certification standards for airplanes.

If the quality is that bad, consumers should spent their recreational dollar on other things or the higher quality RVs. The makers of the junk will go away.

I disagree with most of your statements. What you offer is excuses to continue sub-par RV manufacturing. Everyone is not as affluent as you and cannot afford to purchase the best of everything. Airline transportation or RVs.

What is lacking in the RV industry is foreign competition. When the U.S. auto manufactures built us junk in the '70s, foreign competitors stepped in with better quality vehicles forcing our own U.S. manufactures to change their ways in a hurry.

I have no idea how you inferred from my post that I'm affluent. I'm driving a 20 year old bus around that I do most of the work on myself. It is however a high quality motor home and not some piece of junk paper bag bus you see at Camping World. And there in lies the problem. You see it here all the time.

"I want a new motor home/camper because I'm too spoiled/stupid to deal with something that someone else has already had".

Well then, if you buy a cheap piece of ****, you get what you deserve. Don't complain about quality if you paid bottom dollar for your rig.


And I had a late 60's Toyota. It was a piece of do-do.

I bought a new TT and I'm neither spoiled nor stupid. Many factors were considered when selecting both the TT and the dealer.

So, out of curiosity, at what price point do you think you'll get a "quality" rig v. a piece of ****?

IMHO, there is no way there will be enough foreign competition, to make the kind of changes in the RV industry, like there was in the auto industry.

there's no local market for them to make the larger RVs that we are used to here.

maybe some smaller types of RVs but the cost to ship them here would be prohibitive.

the American RV industry is unique in the world because of the size of RVs we buy.

All it would take is to slow down a bit and take a look at what you are doing. maybe one less unit a day and sell it for a thousand more would make a difference in quality! I would pay a couple thousand more for better quality, heck I would pay that much to have my speakers wired properly. is that the cutoff for a high end TT? proper wiring techniques!

Back in the late 50's and early 60's myself and all my friends worked at the Shasta plant in SoCal, talk about drugs, everytime I see a Shasta from that time period I do my best to avoid it. Quality Control did not exsist at all.It's got to be better today....

So if you took the time to read the story you might understand a bit why we have issues with quality!!

"It was good news for Indiana’s Elkhart County to have an unemployment rate of 3.8% in December" When real unemployment is this low you are at the bottom of the barrel as far as skills goes!

“Subsequently, we are hiring people that have little to no experience" People can be trained it just takes time and a good teacher and training location.

"Another challenge, Bellovich said, is new hires not passing drug screenings post-offer." Having workers still high or hung over from the party the night before is a real issue.

Maybe it is time to expand to areas where there are a higher rate of unemployed skilled workers.

Actually THE KEY phrase in the entire article and what most of this issue REALLY revolves around is this:

"Another challenge, Bellovich said, is new hires not passing drug screenings post-offer. “It is a problem that some employers don’t like to talk about or face up to but it’s one that exists. It happens quite often,” he said."

This has been the dirty little secret of employment for a long time. Otherwise good folks who know what they are doing AND even entry level ones can't get a job because of the drug test and the background checks.

We are creating a new unemployable underclass with these policies that in my view and in the view of many of the CEO's and managers I speak with need to change. The employers focus should be on, ON THE JOB performance not whether you stole a pack of cigarettes when you were 17 or didnt pay your child support.

As for the economics of the RV industry. I have written about it here many times and it is complex and not well understood and most of the arm-chair quarterbacking I read here is written by people who have never owned or run a manufacturing facility of any size and really dont have a handle on the economics or the issues and difficulties therein.

But as long as the FICKLE RV consumer will walk away from a (relatively) high quality product to a much lesser one to save $1000 then we as RV consumers have the RV industry we deserve.

It still amazes me about the amount of people that applies in my department at work and can't pass a drug screen. Just had a 60 y/o woman that couldn't pass her drug screen. :h

I guess I'm too old fashioned and I don't give them enough time to study for the test....:h

4X4Dodger wrote:

This has been the dirty little secret of employment for a long time. Otherwise good folks who know what they are doing AND even entry level ones can't get a job because of the drug test and the background checks.

We are creating a new unemployable underclass with these policies that in my view and in the view of many of the CEO's and managers I speak with need to change. The employers focus should be on, ON THE JOB performance not whether you stole a pack of cigarettes when you were 17 or didnt pay your child support.

...most of the arm-chair quarterbacking I read here is written by people who have never owned or run a manufacturing facility of any size and really dont have a handle on the economics or the issues and difficulties therein.

Seriously?

Go ahead and hire drug impaired individuals to work for you and get back to us a year from now and let us know how it worked for you. That is, if you still have a business.

Having owned a manufacturing facility, I can tell you that I would never allow an impaired employee near a piece of machinery or equipment that could cause serious injury or death to the impaired individual, or to fellow workers. Even if the impaired employee managed to get by without injuries, common sense dictates the impaired employee is bound to produce an inferior product.

Most employers are not concerned about youthful indiscretions when making hiring decisions. They want to make sure there is nothing in the employee's background that could be detrimental to the company. Who is going to hire someone convicted of embezzlement to handle cash or the company's finances? Only a fool. Who's going to hire someone with a history of violence that could go postal on coworkers? Only a fool. By the way, a deadbeat parent does affect the employer when the employer is ordered by the courts to garnish the deadbeat's wages.

Those that can't get employed due to their lifestyle choices and lack of character can only blame themselves. Employers can't be blamed for demanding workers show up to work drug free and sober.

gemsworld wrote:

4X4Dodger wrote:

This has been the dirty little secret of employment for a long time. Otherwise good folks who know what they are doing AND even entry level ones can't get a job because of the drug test and the background checks.

We are creating a new unemployable underclass with these policies that in my view and in the view of many of the CEO's and managers I speak with need to change. The employers focus should be on, ON THE JOB performance not whether you stole a pack of cigarettes when you were 17 or didnt pay your child support.

...most of the arm-chair quarterbacking I read here is written by people who have never owned or run a manufacturing facility of any size and really dont have a handle on the economics or the issues and difficulties therein.

Seriously?

Go ahead and hire drug impaired individuals to work for you and get back to us a year from now and let us know how it worked for you. That is, if you still have a business.

Having owned a manufacturing facility, I can tell you that I would never allow an impaired employee near a piece of machinery or equipment that could cause serious injury or death to the impaired individual, or to fellow workers. Even if the impaired employee managed to get by without injuries, common sense dictates the impaired employee is bound to produce an inferior product.

Most employers are not concerned about youthful indiscretions when making hiring decisions. They want to make sure there is nothing in the employee's background that could be detrimental to the company. Who is going to hire someone convicted of embezzlement to handle cash or the company's finances? Only a fool. Who's going to hire someone with a history of violence that could go postal on coworkers? Only a fool. By the way, a deadbeat parent does affect the employer when the employer is ordered by the courts to garnish the deadbeat's wages.

Those that can't get employed due to their lifestyle choices and lack of character can only blame themselves. Employers can't be blamed for demanding workers show up to work drug free and sober.

While I'm only a department manager our company has a very strict rule about passing a background check and drug screen. There are no grey areas, it's very simple you pass or fail and we do not deviate period. I am 100% supportive of this rule.