West Virginia’s Economic Renaissance: Realizing Our Potential

West Virginia is becoming a major hub for new business ventures. Organizations on a local, national and international scale are choosing the Mountain State as a location to build and expand their companies. The Mountain State is often disregarded when it comes to economics, but with the help of a large team of hard-working individuals, it continues to rise as a promising stronghold.

The West Virginia Department of Economic Development (WVDED) works to provide resources to businesses and help improve the state’s economy by marketing West Virginia as a prosperous site and place worth investing in. It operates through many different teams, that cover areas like leadership, business attraction, research and training and the work the office does with international customers.

The WVDED contains seven divisions: the Small Business Development Center, Office of Community Advancement and Development, Office of Energy, Office of Broadband, Film Office, International Development and Business and Industrial Development.

Mike Graney, executive director of the WVDED, says the collaboration between these divisions is the beauty of the office’s work, as each section contributes respectively to the overall success of the development office.

“We have broken down silos and are moving more at the speed of business than the speed of government,” he says.

When working with businesses that run from within the state, the WVDEC begins by identifying specific ways it can help the business expand. Representatives are placed throughout the state and often work with their respective communities to pinpoint what the office can do for them. In other words, the office is working on a large scale, as its duties range from prioritizing small businesses in West Virginia to forming and maintaining relationships with companies overseas.

While the WVDED caters to many different economic sectors, it tries not to focus on just one when strategizing how to drive economic growth. Instead, it tries to market the state across a wide range of growing businesses.

“A key element of any successful economy is the opportunity for citizens to pursue a wide and virtually unlimited array of careers,” says Mitch Carmichael, secretary of economic development for the WVDEC. “As the many new and existing companies accelerate the economic renaissance occurring in West Virginia, our focus is to facilitate the synergy necessary for a dynamic flywheel of strong and enduring job creation.”

Graney says the state’s leaders, legislature, governor and federal and local leadership all work together to make the office more effective and give the state a competitive advantage. With so many eyes that value West Virginia’s success looking over the development office’s projects and coming up with ideas as a team, success is inevitable.

“You want to make something happen quickly? Because of our collaboration and communication, we can get all the stakeholders together to make an impact and work things out more quickly than we ever have in the past,” Graney says.

Aside from being a great place to grow a business, West Virginia has many products valuable to places all around the world, making it an esteemed export destination.

While in the past the state may have been known best for its coal, it now hosts a much larger supply of items that people are becoming increasingly interested in.

The WVDED has been able to successfully connect with customers from outside the state to which they can market and sell those goods. Graney says while coal and chemicals are some of West Virginia’s more popular exports, the development office’s export assistance professionals assist in selling goods from industries and manufacturers of all different types to those customers.

Consequently, the Office of the Governor announced in 2022 that West Virginia had earned the title of the second highest export growth rate in the nation with $6.2 billion in exports. That number rose even higher last year to $7.6 billion, and more than half of those exports were unrelated to coal.

While it is a major accomplishment, this isn’t the only time West Virginia has risen as one of the nation’s top 10. West Virginia is also first for the lowest turnover rate in manufacturing, second for the lowest workers’ compensation rates, fifth in total energy production and 10th in best business climate. The state has seen more than $10 billion in investments since 2017.

West Virginia also sees a lot of investments from international businesses: 147 international companies from 33 different countries operate within the Mountain State. Much of that success is owed to the office’s representatives who work hard to bring attention to the state’s good qualities and encourage companies to invest in it.

“Look at the company names that operate here: Pietro Fiorentini USA, UNDBIO, Niterra North America Inc, Papier-Mettler. The International Team has an effective track record of identifying, seeking out and closing international development opportunities,” Carmichael says.

The key to a successful workforce often lies in the people behind the scenes who keep it afloat, and the WVDED works to attract the right talent and ensure they see West Virginia as a place to stay. The office can help people see West Virginia not only as a place to start or grow a business but somewhere to settle down and start a family.

Quality of life is something the WVDED highlights, pointing out the state’s high-quality tourism and the wide range of activities its four seasons permit. Carmichael specifically mentions Governor Jim Justice and Tourism Secretary Chelsea Ruby’s positive work in driving tourism, as well as the Ascend West Virginia program, which offers stipends to those who move to West Virginia from out of state and helps remote workers find community through outdoor recreation.

The office also hosts many programs that help new employees learn about the workforce and become integrated quickly and efficiently. Examples include Apprenticeship in Motion, providing free training to implement the apprenticeship model, which helps businesses customize their training programs, and the WVDED’s opportunity zones that provide tax breaks so those areas can further develop and grow.

Graney says spreading the word about successes and opportunities from within the Mountain State also helps catch the eye of new talent, along with implementing unique recruitment tactics, workforce training and effective marketing programs.

“My peers ask me how we are making such an impact on social media because they see our success stories, they see our trade show booths, and they see the impact we are having on our state,” he says.

Carmichael attributes the favorable business climate to Justice and the Legislature, who he says have enacted responsible and practical policies that allow for business to prosper in West Virginia.

With these new milestones for West Virginia’s economic landscape, the world and the state itself are beginning to see that it is a major contender in the business world and should not be overlooked.

The development office is continuing to work to establish an efficient and interactive service to its customers, which Graney says has been a keystone of the administration.

“To me, the world is recognizing what the opportunity in West Virginia is for a good quality of life, a loyal workforce and access to materials and markets. When you pair that with the aligned leadership from local to state to federal and the desire to make progress, positive things happen,” he says.