When a new presidential administration is elected, the future becomes a guessing game.
In the four years following Donald Trump‘s ascendancy to the presidency on Jan. 20, businesses and consumers will be forced to adjust to new policies affecting supply chain and distribution channels, which could create opportunities and challenges for the U.S. economy.
For the manufacturing industry in particular, promises from Trump and running mate J.D. Vance about the implementation of tariffs on certain countries could weigh well for some manufacturers and poorly for others, leaving industry executives playing the waiting while assessing their next move.
Jonathan Dawley
Jonathan Dawley, CEO and president of South Carolina-based KION North America, which produces electric counterbalanced forklifts, said the company is in “scenario-building mode” to adjust to potentially increased tariffs on goods that need to be imported from around the world.
“What we were hoping is we would get to the election, through the election, breathe a sigh of relief, and begin seeing more purposeful movement on markets bouncing back,” Dawley said. “But I am actually kind of perceiving a little bit of stagnation from people doing exactly what we are doing, trying to assess what this is going to mean and determining those next steps.”
Hesitation from global manufacturers
Post-election, Trump has promised to implement a 25% tariff on all products entering the country from Canada and Mexico, as well as an additional 10% tariff on goods from China, in addition to tariffs already in place.
Canada, Mexico and China are the U.S.’s top suppliers, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Rating the current U.S. economy a B+, Joey Von Nessen, a research economist at the Darla Moore School of Business at the University of South Carolina, said the anticipated tariffs could play a large role in hesitation from global manufacturing companies.
Von Nessen
“At the end of the day, if we look broadly, the net effect of tariffs for the U.S. as a whole tends to be negative,” Von Nessen said. “It lowers overall economic activity because the loss associated with price increases for consumers typically outweighs the benefits to the protected industries.”
Tariffs typically affect companies in two ways, Von Nessen said. First is to affect the supply chain, leaving the company paying more for raw materials they may import from overseas.
Second, companies can have disruptions to the distribution channel, Von Nessen said. As the U.S. increases tariffs on its imports, the countries exporting those products may retaliate by putting tariffs on the imports they are receiving from the U.S. as well. The repercussions of that counterattack can affect the demand for the companies in the U.S. that are selling those products.
Recovery for companies that are disturbed by the supply chain and distribution channel hinderances often falls back to whether U.S. companies can replace those needs. If the company can source its materials and sell its product inside the U.S. market, the setbacks can be minor compared to those who can’t, Von Nessen said.
“The business community has seen this before, this is not their first rodeo,” Von Nessen said. “We saw a number of tariffs that were introduced in 2018 during the previous Trump administration that companies had to adjust to, and we had the pandemic which saw massive destructions against supply chains.”
KION North America, headquartered in Summerville, has been looking to localize more of its operations into the U.S. to reduce production time and to have the capability to produce locally for the customer. Dawley said it is hard to scale a business while trying to import products from around the world.
“We have all been working to have a global supply chain for many years,” Dawley said.
As the German company has endured fluctuating freight costs and inflation, Dawley said it has done its best to keep the price of KION products “at bay” for customers.
“It’s unclear to us as to what element of this is going to have to take on a pricing dynamic,” Dawley said. “But my assumption is that in the short-term, there is going to be a pricing dynamic to the end market. The movement to move local doesn’t come for free.”
Dawley said the overall concept of strengthening U.S. product is great for the company, considering KION made the investment to create KION North America, locating to Summerville in 2015. He said though there may be a struggle to find solutions as quickly as possible, KION is “up to the challenge.”
‘Nobody really knows’
Don Cunningham
Similar to South Carolina, Pennsylvania is a manufacturing-based economy, Don Cunningham, CEO and president of the Lehigh Valley Economic Development Corp., said. Companies such as Nestle, Crayola and Ocean Spray have a large presence in the region.
Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania, compares to the Greenville, South Carolina, business market, Cunningham said. The area has ranked as the top mid-sized region in the U.S., with Greenville around fourth in the ranking.
For Cunningham, as a new presidential administration comes into office, businesses’ main concern is the uncertainty of what policies will be enacted, and which ones will be removed.
“There is always a difference between what is said on a campaign trail and what gets enacted and when,” Cunningham said. “It’s like a crystal ball, nobody really knows. I won’t say there is reaction going on yet for different approaches.”
Cunningham said a lot of focus is going toward what programs will be kept or discarded from prior administrations such as The Inflation Reduction Act, The CHIPS and Science Act and stimulus incentive programs. Attention is paid to where the money from those acts will be going considering projects that have been in the works through multiple presidencies.
Cunningham said he doesn’t see many regions pin their success on one party in office or not, since many projects a business begins may endure multiple administrations from its start to finish.
“Presidential administrations come and go, we have Republicans, we have Democrats,” Cunningham said. “Each region really has to keep its head down and keep working on its own economic strategy. Your state government plays a huge role, as does the coordination you have with your local government.”
Benefiting domestic manufacturing
For companies such as Unionwear, a shift to domestic production is nothing new. Unionwear’s hats, bags and other products are most notorious for being entirely U.S. made, even making presidential campaign merchandise as far back as 1992 for President Bill Clinton’s campaign.
The Newark, New Jersey, company recently produced the camo hats for the Harris-Walz presidential campaign.
Mitch Cahn
“We just got so much exposure for doing the presidential merchandise. There are a lot of companies looking to have goods made domestically as a hedge against the tariff issue and we are top of mind for them,” Mitch Cahn, president of Unionwear, said.
Cahn said another concern for the manufacturing industry could be Trump’s drive to implement more strenuous immigration regulations. If there are mass deportations, as promised on the campaign trail, Cahn predicts the demand to rise for positions such as sewing.
The labor force may also see a decrease in numbers due to Baby Boomerswho are retiring in the next five years, according to Von Nessen, the University of South Carolina economist. Employers are left to fill spaces in the workforce where there are not as many workers available.
Still, Cahn sees a bright future for domestic manufacturing.
In 2025 the U.S. will be hosting the FIFA Club World Cup in New York, as well as celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Army, Navy and Marines. The following year is the country’s 250th anniversary celebration, and in 2028 the U.S. will be hosting the summer Olympics in Los Angeles.
Even considering President Trump’s initiatives to enact tariffs as an effort to push for more U.S. markets to benefit, Cahn believes that the upcoming celebrations and events will already be making that impact.
Cahn doesn’t believe that the increased tariffs will have a large impact in the overall growing manufacturing business, noting it takes a long time to scale manufacturing, considering demand for workers and room for additional infrastructure.
“I think that well-thought-out policies that protect American industry without hurting the U.S. economy would be the best way to go,” Cahn said. “Tariffs will certainly help us in the short run but if they are done improperly and they hurt consumers and they hurt the economy, and there is inflation again, then it is definitely going to hurt our business.”
Hollie Moore is a reporter for SC Biz News. Contact her at [email protected].
Inside Richmond’s historic St. John’s Church in November 2024, a film crew and actors recreated the Second Virginia Revolutionary Convention and the enduring speech of Patrick Henry that still evoke chills nearly 250 years later: “I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death.”
This year, events recognizing the nation’s 2026semiquincentennial — or 250th birthday — are ramping up, and Virginia’s Historic Triangle of Williamsburg, Yorktown and Jamestown are ready for their close-up.
Cheryl Wilson leads the Virginia American Revolution 250 Commission, which is planning Virginia’s commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Photo by Matthew R.O. Brown
In the film depicting Virginia’s major role in the birth of the United States, there are other scenes filmed at the Raleigh Tavern and a print shop in Colonial Williamsburg, and it will be screened as part of an exhibit titled “Give Me Liberty,” opening in March at the Virginia Museum of History & Culture in Richmond. It will move to the American Revolution Museum at Yorktown during the anniversary month of July 2026.
The exhibition will also feature a rare copy of the Declaration of Independence, a reproduction of Thomas Jefferson’s writing desk, a manuscript certification of an enslaved man’s enlistment into the Continental Army to do a tour of duty for his enslaver, and a rare copy of Virginia’s 1776 Declaration of Rights, among other artifacts.
For planners of the 250th birthday extravaganza, this is way more than just a single day of history. It’s a decade’s worth of work toward dozens of events, many of which are taking place or being planned in Williamsburg.
“The nation thinks of the 250th as July 4, 2026, but we know that so much happened, particularly in Virginia, that led up to the signing of the Declaration, and then a full war happened after that, with the surrender at Yorktown that secured that independence,” says Cheryl Wilson, executive director of the Virginia American Revolution 250 Commission, which is planning the commonwealth’s commemoration amid the nationwide observance of the July 4, 1776, signing of the Declaration of Independence. While the signing occurred in Philadelphia, Virginia was a pivotal player in the events leading up to the Declaration and the eight-year war that followed.
“That’s why for us it’s an arc that began in 2023 and goes on through 2032,” Wilson explains. The Virginia General Assembly created the VA250 Commission in 2020 to plan the commonwealth’s marking of the occasion, allocating $7 million in state seed money plus a $1 million donation from Dominion Energy.
A grand tapestry Knitting together a statewide commemoration plan requires a broad partnership of localities and restaurants, hotels and tourism associations, says Wilson, who previously led the Virginia Sesquicentennial of the American Civil War Commission and the state’s World War I and World War II Commemoration Commission, which developed statewide programs to mark the 100th and 75th anniversaries of the two world wars.
Those anniversaries boosted tourism throughout the state, attracting about 9 million participants, Wilson says, and VA250 is expected to do the same.
“What I love about the [American Revolution] commemoration is it’s that very special spotlight that shines for a while on the many gems we have here in Virginia,” she adds. “It’s a chance to broaden the stories that some of us grew up hearing. It’s a chance to bring new audiences in. It’s a chance to be inclusive and inviting.”
Even though early planning for the anniversary started several years ago, there’s still work to be done. In late March, semiquincentennial event planners from across the U.S. will gather in Williamsburg for a third and final “A Common Cause to All” national planning session.
Named for words spoken by Thomas Jefferson at the 1773 Virginia Committee on Correspondence held in Williamsburg, the previous two Common Cause sessions in March 2023 and 2024 attracted planners, educators and researchers from three dozen states and included panel discussions and speeches by Gov. Glenn Youngkin and NBC correspondent Harry Smith. Retired Virginia Supreme Court Justice John Charles Thomas urged attendees to move from the simplistic “melting pot” narrative of American history to a more complex tapestry that reflects the struggles and triumphs of all communities.
As host, “Virginia really stepped into a national leadership role, bringing people together,” Wilson says.
The first Common Cause meeting in 2023 examined how Americans with diverse cultural and ideological values see the founders’ era, separating participants into a “traditional” cluster, focusing on the framers and their sacrifices, and a “modern” cluster, embracing differences and inclusivity. At the 2023 session’s conclusion, the attendees met on the steps of Raleigh Tavern, a meeting place for Jefferson, Henry and other founders, and pledged their mutual support by reading aloud a resolution.
“We gathered here, resolve to commemorate our shared American story, recognizing its fullness and complexity, its achievements and shortcomings, and by honoring the many voices that together forge one nation.” the resolution reads in part.
Former Hewlett-Packard CEO and Chair Carly Fiorina, who chairs the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, serves as national honorary chair of VA250 and spoke at the first Common Cause session about the importance of telling the story of many Americans during the 2026 anniversary events.
“Let us acknowledge all our complexities and contradictions. Let us recognize our setbacks as well as our steps forward,” she said in March 2023. “Let us work to discover and share our complete history throughout all our communities and every state. Our 2026 commemoration must be about far more than fireworks and tall ships. It cannot be celebrated by some, resented by others and ignored by most. It must not be about red states and blue states. It must reflect our diversity while reinforcing our union.”
An expansive approach
Wilson says the VA250 planners took Fiorino’s words to heart as localities across the commonwealth expect to host dozens of lectures, reenactments and other events over the next two years.
“Virginia’s history is America’s story,” Wilson says. “We have hundreds and hundreds of sites that are tied directly to the Revolutionary War, the founding of our nation, the Colonial period. But even more than that, when we broaden Virginia’s history, it is America’s story — civil rights, the Civil War. It’s not just the founding of our nation, but it’s that ongoing journey to create a more perfect union. We can find that everywhere in Virginia, and we call that a power of place.”
Christy Coleman, executive director of the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation, remembered being a child living in Williamsburg in 1976, and the impact millions of Bicentennial visitors had on the city.
This time, she wants to be sure the celebration will also spotlight ordinary people and how the American Revolution affected all layers of society.
“We really want to explore the deeper character of these people and these places and these events so that contemporary Americans and global citizens alike can have a deeper understanding of our national origin story and why we continue to get some things right, and why we continue to fail miserably at other things,” she adds.
That goal has influenced anniversary events that have taken place already, as well as those scheduled this year and the next.
Last fall, several cities and counties in Virginia commemorated the 200th anniversary of the Marquis de Lafayette’s 1824 U.S. farewell tour, and York County and Yorktown celebrated the 250th anniversary of the Yorktown Tea Party, during which patriots tossed English tea into the York River in November 1774.
Even more significantly, Colonial Williamsburg last fall reopened the Bray School, the oldest extent school for the education of Black children, in its new and more prominent location. The school, which educated enslaved and free Black children beginning in 1760, had been hidden in plain sight on the edge of the William & Mary campus, but was moved to Colonial Williamsburg and restored to become a focal point for research, scholarship and dialogue about race, religion and education in Colonial America, as well as a significant site for local 250th anniversary events.
Cliff Fleet, president and CEO of Colonial Williamsburg, says VA250 planners and other stakeholders have very different perspectives on presenting history leaders even 50 years ago. People are more willing to examine what he calls the paradox inherent in the nation’s creation and offer a richer story about the entire community involved in the American Revolution — including the nation’s history of slavery and its treatment of Native Americans.
“As we approached this event, we went with a couple of principles that I think are critically important,” Fleet says. “First, we wanted to make sure we were telling a full and complete story, both of the triumphs and also the challenges that were inherent in the formation of our country. We wanted to make sure that all Americans — no matter your background, race, ethnicity [or] gender — could see themselves in our nation’s history. And to do that work, we felt we needed to do it in a fact-based, heavily researched way that continues to expand our story about what it means to be an American.” Fleet and others expect that expanded story to boost tourism in the Historic Triangle over the next few years.
Colonial Williamsburg President and CEO Cliff Fleet says VA250 planners wanted to “make sure we were telling a full and complete story.” Photo by Mark Rhodes
At the American Revolution Museum at Yorktown, the “Fresh Views of the American Revolution” exhibit will open Oct. 18 and continue through May 2026, displaying folk art created by Oscar de Mejo for the 1976 Bicentennial as well as a call for new Revolution-inspired works by students and professional artists. In July 2026, the museum will feature the “Give Me Liberty” exhibit, and in June 2026, 66 tall ships from 20 countries will dock in Yorktown and Norfolk as part of the Sail250 program.
In 2026, Colonial Williamsburg will host a July Fourth celebration of the nation’s 250th birthday, followed by the 100th anniversary of Colonial Williamsburg in November 2026, marking John D. Rockefeller’s funding of the city’s restoration in 1926.
This confluence of historic events is already impacting tourism, says Visit Williamsburg CEO Ed Harris.
Tourism to the city hit about 1.825 million visitors in 2024, and Harris projects local tourism will grow to 1.9 million visitors in 2025 and possibly 2.1 million in 2026. Many tourists will come for the Virginia 250 celebration events, he says, but some will also be traveling to the Williamsburg Sports and Events Center launching in 2026.
Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., are key cities for the 250th anniversary, Harris acknowledges, but “we feel like we’re a big part of the conversation and why visitors should plan a trip to Williamsburg as well. Reminding people of the significance of Williamsburg is going to be really important in the buildup to 2026.”
Historic Triangle at a glance
James City County, York County and the city of Williamsburg make up the Historic Triangle. Located between Hampton Roads and Richmond, the area includes historical attractions, the Busch Gardens Williamsburg theme park and William & Mary, the nation’s second oldest institution of higher learning, chartered in 1693. Joint Base Langley-Eustis is a U.S. military installation formed by the 2010 merger of Langley Air Force Base and the U.S. Army’s Fort Eustis. In use since 1917, Langley is the world’s oldest continuously active Air Force base.
Population
James City County: 78,818
Williamsburg: 15,486
York County: 70,238
Top employers
William & Mary
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation
Sentara Health
York County
Walmart
Williamsburg-James City County
School Board
SeaWorld Entertainment
Major attractions
The American Revolution Museum at Yorktown tells the story of the nation’s fight for independence. Yorktown Battlefield, the site of the Revolutionary War’s final major clash, offers a visitor’s center and guided tours. Colonial Williamsburg, a popular living history attraction showcasing Colonial American life, features museums, lodging, restaurants and shops. Historic Jamestowne is the site of America’s first permanent English settlement and features an archaeological museum with 17th-century artifacts unearthed on site. Jamestown Settlement features a rebuilt interpretation of America’s first permanent settlement. The nearby Busch Gardens Williamsburg and Water Country USA theme parks are the region’s biggest tourism draws.
Top convention hotels
Williamsburg Lodge, Autograph Collection
323 rooms, 45,000 square feet of event space
DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Williamsburg
295 rooms, 42,089 square feet of event space
Fort Magruder Hotel–Trademark Collection by Wyndham
303 rooms, 26,000 square feet of event space
Timmons Group expects to move its headquarters from a Chesterfield County office park into the county’s new Springline at District 60 mixed-use project in the first quarter of 2025.
The five-story, 150,000-square-foot building is one of three buildings in the first phase of the development near the Chippenham Parkway and Midlothian Turnpike intersection that should be ready for occupancy in the first quarter.
The others are James at Springline — a 298-unit apartment building with 28,000 square feet of ground-floor retail and restaurant space and a 417-car parking garage — and a 1,340-car parking garage that will have 790 spaces available by then.
Springline is rising on the 42-acre site of the former Spring Rock Green shopping center, which Chesterfield purchased from Bond Cos. in 2021 for $16 million. Demolition began in March 2023 so the county could build new infrastructure and sell lots. The project’s masterplan also features two hotels, additional apartments and retail space, another 150,000-square-foot office building, a three-story entertainment and corporate office building, and a green space for farmers markets, art shows, concerts and other activities.
“What we’re trying to provide is what the market is saying,” says Garrett Hart, Chesterfield’s director of economic development. “If office is going to come back, it’s going to be Class A with a lot of amenities around it. So that’s what we’re trying to create here and that’s the goal.”
Timmons Group will move 400 employees from The Boulders Office Park to its new $50 million headquarters in Springline. Other tenants will be Chesterfield County Public Schools’ administrative offices and the county’s Department of Economic Development.
Connecticut-based developer Collins Enterprises is completing the $85 million, six-story James at Springline, with leasing beginning in April. The developer also is designing a second building with 230 to 240 apartments and around 15,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space, expected to break ground this year.
Springline has space for at least 650 additional residential units and for restaurants and retail in the future. Additionally, Shamin Hotels plans to open a 120-room Residence Inn by Marriott and a 275-room Hilton Hotel and Conference Center in 2027.
“Our hope,” says Mike Laing, executive vice president of the Richmond project management firm ECI Development Services, “is that we’ll have enough momentum that the entire project will be done in five to seven years.”
Broadband access may become easier to attain for businesses as a Lexington-based company looks to wirelessly transmit data more reliably.
Over the past 22 years, Attochron has been working towards improving what’s referred to in the industry as free-space optical communications (FSOC) — using lasers to send data through air instead of via fiber optic cables.
Attochron is picking up ample momentum, going from finding their first angel investor in 2004 to completing $15 million in Series A funding with New York private equity firm Three Cities Research in July 2024.
“It was about 15 years of baby steps,” says Attochron founder and CEO Tom Chaffee.
FSOC technology has been decades in the making but often ran into issues with how light sent through the air gets broken up and ends up overlapping and interfering with itself, according to Attochron representatives. Attochron aims to remedy this by shortening the pulses their small devices send out, resulting in next to no overlap for limited distances.
“These pulses are extremely short,” says Wayne Knox, professor of optics at the University of Rochester and a paid consultant for Attochron. “They don’t interfere with themselves when we propagate them in the air.”
According to a release from networking market research consultancy Vertical Systems Group, more than 3.8 million U.S. commercial sites had no optical fiber access to network services in 2022.
Being able to send data wirelessly through the air in this way will allow businesses without access to physical fiber optic cables — due to construction costs or security concerns over shared infrastructure — to finally get connected. What exists as “the commercial last mile” direct connection gap between such users and the internet’s backbone can now be overcome, Chaffee says.
“Leave the fiber where it is,” Chaffee says. “But save the money when you’re trying to connect that fiber to that enterprise. Instead of trenching and digging under this and over that, beam the Attochron laser to the customer. We’re only connecting the mile.”
Attochron’s devices aim to beam and receive lasers from one another and require line-of-sight. The company currently has 11 full-time employees and about six consultants, according to Chaffee. Though its devices were not yet commercially available as of November 2024, Attochron has worked with Louisiana telecom company Lumen Technologies to test its products in the Blue Ridge Mountains and is seeking growth and investment, Chaffee says.
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