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Finding great salespeople is never easy, says Eric Crown. But the Phoenix metropolitan area is the best place that he knows to look in. It doesn't hurt that the city has become a telemarketing capital of sorts, creating an experienced labor pool to draw on. Just as important, the city seems to attract the people Crown is looking for. Each year 61,000 new residents move into Greater Phoenix, filling the desert with spanking-new houses and broad freeways. These modern-day pioneers often exhibit the kind of go-getter attitude that Crown wants in his salespeople. "It's a very qualified, competent, and open-to-learning labor pool," says Rick Weddle, president of the Greater Phoenix Economic Council.

"I have looked at other cities when I have considered opening new call centers, and I cannot find a better place" in terms of talent, says Crown. And the numbers back him up. Labor costs, on average, are lower in Phoenix than in California. (See "Relative Wages," below.) Yet Phoenix's population is larger than other areas with relatively low labor costs, such as Raleigh-Durham and Salt Lake City. (See "Size Matters," below.)

One problem, though, is Phoenix's time zone. When you sell to the East Coast from Phoenix, your people have to come to work at 5 in the morning to start making calls. It's tough to generate a lot of enthusiasm at the crack of dawn. To ease the strain, Crown opened the Montreal call center. "Montreal had a large labor pool with high unemployment," says Crown. "I can pay wages lower than in the United States" -- about 20% lower, he claims -- "and get a more educated workforce."

In these days of tight labor markets, ease of recruiting has become a significant factor in choosing a business location. It was the number one reason CEO Alan Dabbiere chose Atlanta (the #3 large metro area) as the new home for his $75-million software company, Manhattan Associates.

Dabbiere had founded the company in Manhattan Beach, Calif., in 1991. By 1995 he wanted to be on the East Coast, closer to his customers, the retailers and retail suppliers that bought Manhattan Associates' distribution software. "We were at a point in the life cycle where we knew we would have fairly rapid growth," he says.

At first, Dabbiere settled on the New South boomtown of Charlotte, N.C. (#14 among the large metro areas). He went so far as to pick out office space there. But as the time to move got closer, Charlotte began to seem a little small. "After my third trip, I was starting to go back to the same restaurants for dinner. I knew something was wrong," Dabbiere says. "Talking to recruiters and job candidates at the time, we saw that most people felt that Atlanta would be a much stronger city for recruiting."

It wasn't just the restaurants. Atlanta was more of a high-tech hub than Charlotte was and had a larger labor pool of engineers and developers. (According to the latest figures from the American Electronics Association, Atlanta has 112,797 high-tech jobs, Charlotte 27,462.) And though Manhattan Associates might face more competition in hiring in Atlanta, the concentration of high-tech jobs also proved a draw for recruits from out of town, says Dabbiere. Atlanta's bigger pond provided some assurance that they could build their careers in the city without having to move if they changed jobs.

Good Living, Good People
Twelve years ago Peter Altman was living in Plano, Tex., just outside Dallas (#9 among the large metro areas) -- but only, he's quick to add, because that's where he landed his first job out of college. The area, with its brand-new subdivisions and glass office complexes sprouting from old farmland, bored him stiff. "I didn't like Dallas -- it was flat, concrete, and didn't have much character," Altman says.

And it wasn't where he spent his free time. Weekends, he'd motor some 200 miles south to see friends and take in live music on Sixth Street in Austin (the #2 small metro area). Now that was a town. Perched among rolling limestone hills, home of the sprawling University of Texas, Austin managed to be cutting-edge cool and relatively easygoing at the same time. "It stuck with me that Austin would be a neat city to work in," he says.

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