This may be old news to some, but I just discovererd that Belkin, maker of all sorts of gadgets, was founded and still thrives in Compton, California. Inc. wrote about the rise of the business in this ill-fated city back in 2003.
It’s not too much of a stretch to compare Belkin to its inner-city surroundings in Compton, Calif.: neither possesses the kind of buzz-generating, love-at-first-sight glitz that inspires devotion. Pipkin balked, in fact, when his real estate agent first suggested a Compton industrial park as a location for his growing company. It was 1991; a few years earlier the city had been immortalized by one of the first “gangsta rap” groups, NWA, whose Straight Outta Compton album was a hard-core celebration of gang violence (“here’s a murder rap to keep yo dancin’ with a crime record like Charles Manson”). Crips and Bloods carved the city up into north/south territories. Pipkin worried about “the stigma that might come with a Compton address, and our ability to recruit and retain people.” Plus, the building was so rundown that gutting the interior was cheaper than repairing it. Never mind, insisted the agent. Compton was halfway between the Los Angeles Airport and two harbors — perfect for a company that shipped and received goods nationally and globally. And the rent was, well, dirt-cheap. So Pipkin took a leap of faith and moved in. He’s never regretted it, even when, a year later, the Rodney King verdict triggered massive civil unrest in the area. “You could look out the back of our shipping door and see various things on fire,” recalls Pipkin. On the first day of the riots, police strongly suggested that Belkin’s employees evacuate the office. Compton would ultimately suffer $100 million in building damage.
It was a rocky time, but Compton’s shortcomings ultimately became Belkin’s assets. “We needed a ready work force and access to a lot of people quickly,” says human resources director Donna Pierson. Compton, where 37% of residents live below the poverty line, was home to several effective public programs designed to train workers in disadvantaged areas. They funneled some 100 entry-level employees into warehousing, assembly, and order fulfillment at the company. Pierson even went to Mexico twice for month-long Spanish immersion programs so that she could communicate with the new workers.
