Insyte is proud to announce that we have surpassed $1 billion in client impact in WNY for the period from 2000 to 2012.
What does “client impact” mean? Simply put, it is the quantifiable benefit of the project work that WNY manufacturers have done with Insyte. These figures are particularly meaningful because they are not our own guesstimates, but come from our clients through an independent survey process conducted on behalf of the federal government. We receive a portion of our funding through the U.S. Department of Commerce (USDoC) Manufacturing Extension Partnership program. To ensure that these funds are put to good use, the USDoC hires an independent, third-party survey company to contact each of our clients to quantify any benefits that client realized from their project(s) with Insyte. In other words, the government wants to make sure they are making a good investment.
Governor Cuomo has been widely praised in WNY for his pledge to invest a $1 billion here for economic development. Some comparisons may be helpful to appreciate the size and significance of these client impact figures:
$1,000,000,000 is greater than First Niagara’s annual revenue
$1,000,000,000 equals about 2.5% of annual gross domestic product (GDP) for the Buffalo-Niagara Metropolitan Area and about 15% of its annual manufacturing GDP
7,207 jobs is more than the number of total employment of the University at Buffalo
7,207 jobs is greater than the top em- ployer in Allegany, Cattaraugus, Chautauqua and Niagara Counties combined
7,207 jobs equates to more than 1 out of every 10 manufacturing jobs in WNY
$147 million in capital investments is more than the WNY Regional Economic Development Council’s initial award of $100 million from New York State in 2011
$147 million is greater than the com- bined grants of the Oishei Foundation, the Community Foundation for Greater Buffalo, the Gebbie Foundation, the Sheldon Foundation and the other top 30 foundations in WNY in 2011
Those comparisons may be interesting, but this $1 billion milestone is significant to us for other reasons.
First and foremost, it indicates that we are fulfilling our mission and providing value for our clients. They report an average of $1.37 million in impact from each project with Insyte, which equates to an average return on investment of more than $37 to $1. We are also very aware that jobs saved or created is a measure of the human impact of our work, especially during the recent recession. An important side benefit of keeping people employed is that they pay taxes and purchase goods and services. New York State estimates that each of the jobs we helped to create or save is worth a little more than $48,000 in annual compensation, which would generate approximately $3,000 in income taxes. Using that very rough estimate, 7,207 jobs would add more than $20 million a year to New York’s coffers for any number of uses: debt reduction, school aid, Superstorm Sandy relief, infrastructure repairs, etc.
Many of us work hard for years with only a vague sense of the impact we are having on our organizations and our communities. Thanks to the USDoC’s impact surveys, we get a precise estimate every quarter of how Insyte is doing in dollars and cents. Quarter after quarter, year after year, decade after decade those numbers begin to add up, even for a little organization like ours (albeit the largest management consultancy in WNY). So we will keep doing what we have been doing, working one project, one company at a time to add value, to make a difference and to strengthen WNY.
