Coastal Bend Turns Out Array of Products
Published May 27, 2008
Aunt Aggie De’s Pralines are shipped nationwide.
Whether it’s software, sideboards or a snack, chances are you’ll find it made in the Coastal Bend.
Easy access to land and sea transportation, coupled with a solid local workforce, makes the area attractive to startup companies as well as those looking to relocate or expand their operations. And as the region has grown, so has the range of goods and services produced.
“We’ve got everything from candy makers all the way up to the refiners and big marine manufacturers, so it’s diverse not only in size but also in terms of product mix,” says Steve Jenkins, vice president of business development for the Corpus Christi Regional Economic Development Corp.
Even though the region isn’t as well known as some other parts of the country for software development, it’s home for CoffeeCup Software Inc., which launched in 1996 and now has released more than 25 products.
CoffeeCup’s applications are geared toward helping individuals create Web sites, and it produces a mixture of freeware, shareware and for-purchase products. The company currently is retooling all of its applications for use on Apple computers.
Founded in downtown Corpus Christi, CoffeeCup has moved to bigger spaces as it has grown, says Bob Visser, chief financial officer.
“We’ve always stayed in the center of downtown,” Visser says. “We’ve been able to be successful here.”
Skilled Workers Are Key
Another company that calls Corpus Christi home is Collection Reproductions Inc., a maker of Old World-style handcrafted furniture. With hundreds of catalog items and custom pieces in the product line, it was essential to have skilled workers early on, says Jack Solovey, president and chief executive officer.
“We’ve been able to find people that will stay and are willing to be trained,” Solovey says. “What we do is unusual, and it’s certainly not repetitious like normal furniture making, so we have to find people who have an artistic sense about them.”
Many of Collection Reproductions’ 36 employees have been with the company almost from the beginning in the early 1980s. That loyalty has played into the company’s decision to grow in the area by purchasing property and putting down roots.
“It’s a very good place to be,” Solovey says. “We’ve been able to grow here without borrowing money, and we’ve also been able to expand our market from here.”
Sweet Success Story
Then there’s Sinton-based Aunt Aggie De’s Pralines, whose pralines and other candies are sold in stores nationwide.
Eleanor Harren founded the company in 1987 after a brief stint in the food-service business. “My children were out of college, and so I started a catering company,” Harren says. “It was much harder than what I wanted to do, and since I’d been serving our pralines at our events, I figured it would be easier to make those than carry all those silver trays.”
She prepared a batch, took them to three restaurants and said if they didn’t sell, they would be free. A week later she had orders for more. The company now employs 25 workers, with additional work brought in during pre-holiday periods.
“We’re throughout the United States wholesale, and we ship anywhere in the world,” Harren says. “It’s absolutely wonderful here for manufacturing – you’ve got a workforce that needs jobs, and we just love doing it.”
Indeed, a recurring theme in the Coastal Bend is ease of doing business. A deep-water port is key for large manufacturers, but for smaller companies, the stable workforce and overall business climate are among the most attractive aspects of doing business here.
“There are a lot of companies that we go after, and one of our goals is to maintain the diversity we have here because that’s one of the best things we have to promote,” Jenkins says.
Story by Joe Morris
Photo by Brian McCord
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