When you think of distinguishing industries in Northeast Minnesota you probably aren't thinking of Cut & Sew Apparel Manufacturing or Other Textile Product Mills. This is perhaps fair, but maybe you should! Both industries are among the top ten most concentrated industry groups in the region. More well known, Metal Ore Mining, Pulp, Paper & Paperboard Manufacturing, Logging, and Pipeline Transportation are industries that are strongly associated with the economic history of the region, and are the only four that are more concentrated than Cut & Sew Apparel Manufacturing as of 2021.

These two industries create everything from custom sports jerseys to outdoor wear, goods, and equipment that have become synonymous with the Minnesota northwoods experience. Using location quotients, we can compare how concentrated employment in an industry is compared to other areas, or in this case, the entire state of Minnesota. A location quotient of 1.0 means that employment makes up the same share of local employment as it does at the statewide level. A location quotient of 4.4 for Cut & Sew Apparel Manufacturing means that employment in the industry in the region is 4.4 times more concentrated regionally than it is statewide. Similarly, Other Textile Product Mills has a location quotient of 2.7, the 9th most concentrated industry group in the region (see Figure1).

While Manufacturing employment in Northeast Minnesota represents only 2.7% of the total Manufacturing employment statewide, more than 43% of Minnesota's Textile Bag & Canvas Mills (a sub-industry of Other Textile Product Mills) jobs were located in the region (see Table 1). As a result, Textile Bag & Canvas Mills had a location quotient of 8.9 in Northeast Minnesota. Similarly, more than a fifth of Minnesota's Cut & Sew Apparel Manufacturing jobs were in the region.

Together, Other Textile Product Mills and Cut & Sew Apparel Manufacturing accounted for 320 jobs in Northeast in 2022, just under 4% of the region's Manufacturing job total. Many of the goods that are produced locally are then sold via businesses in the related industry of Merchant Wholesalers, Nondurable Goods.

Despite the high concentration of Cut & Sew Apparel Manufacturing employment, the long-term trend is toward job loss in the region. Since 2000, employment in the industry is down more than 50% from a high of more than 225 jobs (see Table 2). Since the end of the Great Recession in 2010, employment losses in Cut & Sew continued, while the overall Manufacturing sector rebounded slightly (+4.6%).

Since 2010, Textile Bag & Canvas Mills experienced robust growth, expanding almost 10 times faster than the overall Manufacturing rate. And while employment losses occurred across most Manufacturing industries since before the COVID-19 pandemic, Textile Bag & Canvas Mills have enjoyed a recent above-average resurgence, while Cut & Sew Apparel Manufacturing employment continued to decline.

Whatever the near future brings, these two uniquely concentrated Manufacturing industries are likely to remain highly concentrated in Northeast Minnesota, contributing to the diversity of the region's economy for years to come.

For More Information

Contact Carson Gorecki, Labor Market Analyst, at carson.gorecki@state.mn.us.