Reno, Nevada: a lucky spot for contact centers. (RE: Locations).Be honest...when you think of Reno, Nevada, what immediately comes to mind? Casinos, gambling, slot machines, keno, 21, roulette roulette (r  lĕt`), game of chance popular in gambling casinos, and in a simplified form elsewhere. In gambling houses the roulette wheel is set in an oblong table. and other
games of chance? You're only part correct. This city of almost
187,000 people in Washoe County, Nevada Washoe County is a county located in the U.S. state of Nevada. As of the 2000 census, the population was 339,486. As of July 1, 2006, the population of Washoe County is officially estimated at 409,085. Its county seat is Reno6. has not only those
opportunities, but you may be surprised to know that it has a thriving,
growing call center industry as well. Over 50 companies (at last count)
have found the area to be quite conducive con·du·cive adj. Tending to cause or bring about; contributive: working conditions not conducive to productivity. See Synonyms at favorable. to business growth and development while also delivering world-class customer service and generating new sales and revenues. Thanks to the offices of the Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada (EDAWN EDAWN Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada ), I was able to spend a few days visiting several of the call center enterprises in the community and talk to many corporate executives in the area about their experiences in operating call centers, administrative support centers, technical support centers and customer service centers. EDAWN, as it is best known in state and national economic development circles, is a non-profit public/private partnership created to work on behalf of companies looking to launch, expand or relocate re·lo·cate v. re·lo·cat·ed, re·lo·cat·ing, re·lo·cates v.tr. To move to or establish in a new place: relocated the business. v.intr. operations to the Reno/Sparks/Lake Tahoe area. Working closely with EDAWN is the economic development group at Sierra Pacific Power Company, an investor-owned utility which provides electric gas and water service and stands ready to service even more call center operations moving to the community. Following are some facts for you to review and consider about the area. Population According to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. the Nevada Department of Taxation and the Nevada State Demographer's office, the numbers are: Reno:186,883 Sparks: 71,753 Washoe County: 353,271 The Reno/Sparks MSA (Metropolitan Service Area) An urban area with at least 50,000 people plus surrounding counties. There are 306 MSAs and 428 RSAs (rural service areas) in the U.S. MSAs and RSAs are used to allocate cellular licenses. population average growth rate was 3.0 percent from 1980 to 1989, 2.8 percent from 1990 to 2000 and 3.3 percent growth from 2000 to 2001, which was almost three times the growth rate for the United States United States, officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. during those same periods. Ancedotal information suggests a number of people moving from California to the area. Age Distribution In the population most likely to be employed in call centers, the Reno/Sparks MSA boasts the following numbers: Age Group Numbers of Persons 20 -24 23,677 25-34 49,088 35-44 56,040 Racial Profile White 73% Hispanic or Latino 17% Black 2% Asian 4% Native American 2% Income Household Income Under $15,000 13% $15,000 - $24,999 17% $25,000 - $34,999 20% $35,000 - $49,999 21% $50,000 - $74,999 19% over $75,000 12% Per capita income Noun 1. per capita income - the total national income divided by the number of people in the nation income - the financial gain (earned or unearned) accruing over a given period of time in the Reno MSA/Washoe County has grown from $28,603 in 1995 to $34,879 in 2000. Labor Force The labor force in the Reno MSA was 195,600 as of April 2003 compared to 197,300 in April 2002, representing a 1.7 percent decrease, with decreases being recorded in the leisure and hospitality industry, but with increases in the financial services The examples and perspective in this article or section may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please [ improve this article] or discuss the issue on the talk page. industry and the services-producing sectors, This means that new call centers in the market will likely draw workers from the hospitality and gaming industries. The result will be the availability of workers with great customer service skills and backgrounds, as well as workers with information technology skills on which the gaming industry is based. It should be noted that the 24-hour, 7-day-a-week worker availability is a part of the local workforce due in large part to the gaming industry. This works favorably fa·vor·a·ble adj. 1. Advantageous; helpful: favorable winds. 2. Encouraging; propitious: a favorable diagnosis. 3. for those centers seeking a 24x7 workforce. The April 2003 unemployment rate was 4.7 percent, with 9,200 people seeking employment. It is interesting to note the projections by the Nevada State Department of Employment with the following predictions from year 2000 through year 2010: * Management occupations will increase from 13,150 to 17,147, * Business and financial occupations will increase from 5,155 to 6,726, * Sales and related occupations will grow from 22,977 to 28,933, and * Office and administrative support will grow from 38,039 to 45,906. The educational institutions in the area are also a great source for workers. The University of Nevada University of Nevada could refer to either of the universities in the Nevada System of Higher Education:
Nevada Is A Right-To-Work State Additional valuable resources are available through Nevada Works, which is the northern Nevada workforce board. It targets federal and private resources to assist employers in developing and training employees. This organization coordinates the efforts of all training partners to provide maximum response to meet employers needs. The Nevada JobConnect, an agency of the stare, provides up-to-date job postings and a reliable system for anyone in the U.S. to review these jobs and e-mail or fax their resumes to Reno for employer consideration. The people I spoke with in this office were extremely committed and dedicated to responding to the employers and the job applicants. Wages Some selected wage data for the year 2000 for the Reno MSA are compiled and provide some interesting comparisons: * Retail industry average annual wage is $21,619, with an average weekly wage of $416, * Service industry average annual wage is $28,521, with an average weekly wage of $548, and * Hotels and gaming average annual wage is $22,134, with an average weekly wage of $426. Many of the call centers related that their starting wages were in the $8.00 to $10.00 per hour range. According to one survey conducted by a local staffing company, an average call center wage is $9.35 per hour. Call Centers There are 53 call centers in the area, employing over 3,600 people. Based on my conversations with many of the call center executives, they are planning growth and predict no problems in finding new people to fill the jobs. Some of the larger call center employers are Wells Fargo Wells Fargo armored carriers of bullion. [Am. Hist.: Brewer Dictionary, 1147] See : Protectiveness Wells Fargo company that handled express service to western states; often robbed. [Am. Hist. , West Teleservices, Harley Davidson, Excel Communications Excel Communications was founded in 1988 by Dallas entrepreneur Kenny Troutt as a long distance reseller in the US telecom sector at the birth of telecom deregulation. , America West, Intuit in·tu·it tr.v. in·tu·it·ed, in·tu·it·ing, in·tu·its Usage Problem To know intuitively. [Back-formation from intuition. and SBC (1) (SBC Communications Inc., San Antonio, TX, www.sbc.com) A large, national telecommunications company that grew from a multitude of local and regional companies, including Southwestern Bell, Pacific Bell and Nevada Bell, into a single, unified brand by 2002. , each with several hundred agents. Table 1 provides you with information on the variety and functions of call centers in the Reno area It is interesting to note that several of these centers have multilingual mul·ti·lin·gual adj. 1. Of, including, or expressed in several languages: a multilingual dictionary. 2. agents and offer customer support in both Spanish and Japanese. Telecommunications Communicating information, including data, text, pictures, voice and video over long distance. See communications. There are multiple telecommunications providers in the area, with extensive fiber optics fiber optics, transmission of digitized messages or information by light pulses along hair-thin glass fibers. Each fiber is surrounded by a cladding having a high index of refractance so that the light is internally reflected and travels the length of the fiber availability, including Nevada Bell Bell Telephone Company of Nevada was the Bell System's telephone provider in Nevada. It only provides telephone services to 30% of the state, not including Las Vegas, where service is provided by Embarq, formerly Sprint. , part of the SBC Global network, and Sierra Pacific Communications, The telecommunications infrastructure in highly digital and redundant with excellent Internet access See how to access the Internet. and wireless capabilities which are in some cases present in selected buildings. AT&T, MCI (1) (Media Control Interface) A high-level programming interface from Microsoft and IBM for controlling multimedia devices. It provides commands and functions to open, play and close the device. (2) (Microwave Communications Inc. and Sprint have points of presence in downtown Reno. It is worthy of mentioning that the Reno Tahoe Tech Center (RTTC RTTC Regional Technology Transfer Center (NASA) RTTC Redstone Technical Test Center RTTC Rails-To-Trails Conservancy RTTC Real Time Travel Connections (South Africa) RTTC Regional Technical Transfer Center ), encompassing some 70 acres and 850,000 square feet of Class A office space, is being developed and will have the latest technology advances available, including a point of presence and fiber optics. Redundant Networks is another company bringing state-of-the-art telecommunications and data facilities to Reno. The company will provide highly secure colocation data centers with bulletproof glass Strictly, bulletproof glass would be glass that is capable of stopping most manner of bullets fired at it. Such glass cannot currently be made in any usable thickness (if at all), so what is loosely called bulletproof glass is, within the industry, referred to as , walls laced with chemical fiber and backup systems Noun 1. backup system - a computer system for making backups ADP system, ADPS, automatic data processing system, computer system, computing system - a system of one or more computers and associated software with common storage . This system will be duplicated in Reno and in Raleigh, North Carolina For other uses of this name, see Raleigh. Raleigh (IPA: /ˈrɑli/, ral-ee) is the capital of the State of North Carolina and the county seat of Wake County. . Office Space Class A office space in the Reno central business district ranges from $16.20 to $24.00 and Class B ranges from $14.40 to $16.80 in the same area. Outside the central business district space ranges from $18.00 to $19.20 for Class A space to $13.20 to $14.00 for Class B space. Reno Recognition Reno has been recognized for its business attractiveness by a variety of entities. * The Milken Institute rated Reno as one of six emerging technology centers in the U.S., * The American Electronics Association The American Electronics Association (now known as AeA) is a nationwide non-profit trade association that represents all segments of the technology industry in the United States. ranked it second in high-tech job growth, * Inc. magazine has ranked Reno as one of the best places to start and grow a business, and * Forbes-Milken Institute ranked Reno as one of the top 50 places for business and career advancement. Expanding your call center to Reno would be a great move. This area has shown admirable ad·mi·ra·ble adj. Deserving admiration. ad  mi·ra·ble·ness n.ad growth and stability, coupled with an exceptionally pro-business environment. To find out more about the area, contact EDAWN at www.edawn.org. I always welcome your comments and ideas for new subjects regarding locations. Remember to visit www.callcentersites.net, the official site for call center and back-office information worldwide for the latest announcements on locations for call centers. You can e-mail me at any time at jbeatty@callcentersites.net. Table 1 Reno area call centers. NAME INDUSTRY TYPE OF CENTER Alee medical customer service America West airline reservations American Call Center service bureau customer service Answerwest answering service customer service Apria Health Care medical customer service BHC service customer service Bonanza Nuts & Bolts manufacturing customer service CDS Health Care medical customer service Charter Communications cable customer service Circus Circus casino customer service/sales Cisco Systems financial customer service Comm'l Tele Exch service customer service Credit Payment Systems loans customer service Darby Group service sales Employers Insurance Co. loans customer service Excel Communications service customer service/sales Gizmo Wireless telecom customer service Harley Davidson insurance customer service Hartford insurance customer service/sales Henry Schein wholesale customer service/sales Hilton casino customer service/sales Hometown Health medical customer service Horizon USA wholesale customer service Infosearch service customer service Inter-Tel telecom customer service Intuit software customer service JB Dental wholesale sales/research MDA service customer service Microflex manufacturing sales Nevada Wireless telecom sales Norwood manufacturing customer service Omnitrition wholesale sales ORC service customer service Patagonia manufacturing customer service Quadravision cable customer service/sales Reno Disposal service customer service/sales RGJ media customer service/sales RSR wholesale customer service/sales SBC (Nevada Bell) telecom customer service Sierra Pacific utility customer service/sales Sportif wholesale customer service/sales State Farm insurance customer service Summit Racing wholesale sales Tele-com service customer service Trinet payroll customer service/sales Tessco service customer service UDS Innotrac fulfillment customer service United Blood Services service customer service University of NV Reno fundraising sales UNR Surgery Center research research/survey Wells Fargo banking customer service/sales West Teleservices service customer service/sales Zhermack medical customer service/sales Source: Hire Dynamics; Reno, Nevada Call Center Executive Forum EDAWN, Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada. |
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