Grand Traverse County, Michigan

• Aging population: Median age of 44 is materially above the U.S. norm; succession planning and senior-services demand are real factors.

• Largest sector: Health Care and Social Assistance employs 11,318 workers (27.1% of tracked sectors), at an average wage of $72,411.
• Economic scale: Regional GDP of $7.5B (2024).
• Wage stratification: Finance and Insurance averages $102,511 while Accommodation and Food Services averages $30,405, a 3.4x spread in the same local economy, with implications for workforce development and talent strategy.

• Top specialization: Textile Product Mills concentrates at 12.56x the national norm, top-decile concentration, the kind of signature sector that defines a region's economic identity to site selectors.
• Cluster depth: 10 sub-sectors register LQ ≥ 1.5, suggesting an interconnected industrial base rather than reliance on a single employer or sector.
• Attraction whitespace: 8 sub-sectors register LQ < 0.5, candidates for diversification or recruitment depending on labor-market fit.

• In line with national: Home value to income ratio of 4.2x sits near the ~4.1x national average; affordability is neither a clear advantage nor a recruitment friction.
• High home ownership: 77.2% owner-occupied; rental supply may be tight for incoming workers.
• Elevated vacancy: 14.3% vacancy rate. In resort, rural, and seasonal markets much of this is recreational/seasonal (second homes), not available supply; confirm the vacancy-by-reason split before treating it as a redevelopment opportunity.
• Broadly affordable rents: All 5 HUD Fair Market Rent bedroom tiers sit below the 30%-of-median-income affordability threshold (~$2,041/mo), a clear cost-of-living advantage for workforce attraction.

• Succession risk is real: 24.6% of working-age residents are 55-64. Plan for retirements over the next decade and pair attraction strategy with talent retention.
• Short commutes: 20.6-minute mean commute is a quality-of-life and labor-access advantage worth surfacing for site selectors.
• Talent pipeline: 6 regional institutions feed the workforce; the top three combined produce 35,780 annual credentials.

Grand Traverse County shows strong potential for textile product mills attraction, with a 12.56x concentration and 391 jobs in this sub-sector. It ranks in the top decile nationally. Near-term succession risk is elevated, with 24.6% of the working-age population within 10 years of retirement age.

The interconnected base across textile product mills, beverage and tobacco product manufacturing, and creates supply-chain attraction leverage rather than single-employer risk, a structural advantage for industrial recruitment.