Salt Lake City, Utah-based Black Diamond, the iconic designer and manufacturer of climbing, mountaineering, backpacking equipment and apparel, has announced that they will be outsourcing their manufacturing to Taiwan which will result in the loss of 70 jobs in Utah, commencing in September 2019.
Black Diamond President John Walbrecht noted, “The Black Diamond team has many ideas about the future technology of climbing. And we’re talking ideology that spans the next 30 years, not next season. We cannot afford to let manufacturing technologies limit what we can do. BD has a responsibility to innovate the best equipment we can, to make our product lighter, faster and stronger. As such, our search for different materials, technologies and best places to manufacture will never end. It’s not about Salt Lake, Taiwan, or anyone place in particular. For us to live up to this mandate, we need to always lead with design and development. For BD to be competitive long term in the carabiner market we had to outsource the technology to develop the type of carabiners that we are designing because we could not do that competitively or technologically here in our in house facility. It was a tough decision for us, laying off 70 people from the BD family, many of whom are friends and have worked for the brand for many years. Because our mission is to design and develop the best climbing, backcountry ski and mountain equipment in the world, we were faced with this necessary decision in order to achieve our future vision.”
Change is coming. There will always be a tomorrow, no matter how much you may try to ignore it. There are no guarantees in life, or promises for a bright future. Just because something bad hasn't happened yet, doesn't mean it won't. It can happen to anyone, anytime, anywhere. No one is guaranteed to wake up tomorrow and still have a job by evening. Are you now wondering, Am I Next?