Most site decisions start with a spreadsheet: rent, incentives, wages, tax. Those numbers matter. But they describe what a location costs, not whether you can staff it. A new plant, a finance shared services team or a data group in a second city will only perform as well as the people you can hire and keep there.
This applies whether you are opening a satellite office in Alberta, adding a second shift in Ohio, or moving back-office work to a lower-cost city. Here is how to test the talent side before you sign a lease.
Why cheaper can end up costing more
A low-cost market looks good in year one, when you need 10 people. It looks different in year three, when you need 60 and the work has grown more complex. Early teams often handle routine tasks. Later they take on reporting, analytics, quality, planning and customer-facing work, and those roles need experience.
We see the same pattern in hiring generally. A market that is 8% cheaper on wages but takes twice as long to fill a role is not cheaper. You pay in vacancy time, overtime for the existing team, missed deadlines and rushed hires who leave within a year.
Questions to answer before the site is chosen
Start with the roles, not the building. List the 10 to 15 positions the new team needs in the first two years, then test each one against the local market.
- Depth: How many people already work in these roles within a reasonable commute? Not how many graduate, but how many are employed and could be recruited.
- Competition: Which employers hire the same skills nearby, and what do they pay? One large competitor can absorb a small market.
- Pipeline: Are there colleges, trade programs or universities producing people for these jobs? Check program sizes and placement rates, not just names.
- Experience mix: Can you find supervisors, senior analysts and lead hands, or only entry-level people?
- Mobility: Will people relocate in, or will you rely on the local pool alone?
Public data helps here. Statistics Canada and Job Bank give regional employment, wage and vacancy figures by occupation in Canada. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes occupational employment and wage data by metropolitan area. Use them to size the pool before you speak to anyone.
Look at retention as hard as hiring
Planning tends to focus on getting the first hires through the door. Turnover is what quietly sinks a new site. Every departure means a recruiting cost, a training period and lost knowledge that took months to build.
Before committing, find out:
- What typical tenure looks like for similar roles in that market
- Whether wages are rising quickly because of competing projects
- How commute, housing costs and transit affect who will stay
- Whether the work you are offering is more or less interesting than what local employers provide
If the answers are poor, you can still choose the location. You will just need to budget for higher pay, better onboarding and a stronger internal development plan.
Do not forget the people who lead
Employers often plan for technicians, operators, analysts and developers, then realize they have nobody to run them. A new site needs a manager who can handle staffing, report to head office, solve problems on the spot and keep standards consistent with the rest of the business.
Decide early whether you will transfer a leader from an existing site, promote from within or hire locally. Each has a cost. A transferred leader brings culture but may not stay. A local hire knows the market but needs time to learn your systems. Whichever you choose, name the person before opening, not after the first quarter goes badly.
Plan for growth, not just day one
Ask how fast the market could absorb you if demand doubled. A city that can supply 15 operators over six months may not supply 50. Build a hiring plan in phases, and set triggers: if a role stays open past a set number of weeks, you adjust pay, widen the search radius or bring in outside help.
One example from our own work: a food manufacturer in the GTA made over 20 hires in 18 months across production, skilled trades and office roles. What made it manageable was that the roles were planned in sequence and the hardest ones, the skilled trades, were started first rather than last.
A simple scorecard
| Factor | Weight it heavily if |
|---|---|
| Talent depth | You will exceed 25 hires |
| Wage pressure | Competitors cluster nearby |
| Leadership supply | The site runs independently |
What to do next
Before comparing incentives, write down the roles you need for the first 24 months and test each against public labour data and a few real conversations with local employers and candidates. Rank sites by how likely you are to fill and keep those roles, then look at cost.
If you are weighing a new location or a second site, a Traverse recruiter can help you gauge what the local market will actually supply.