Dean Solon built a staggering fortune by not making his products in China, even though that’s what nearly everyone else in the field does — and he’s all too willing to share his winning strategy.
At Shoals Technologies’ 100,000-square-foot factory in Portland, Tennessee, Dean Solon’s quest for simplicity starts with the color-coded shirts, inspired by Sesame Street, that his workers wear. “The SunPower logo was yellow, so that’s Big Bird. First Solar was red, for Elmo,” he says. Those working on an order for Blattner Energy, a big solar contractor, sport Cookie Monster blue. “And then we have the Count, in purple. He’s always counting. Those are the quality control people.”
Shoals’ nonunionized workers at four factories in Tennessee and Alabama make the guts for big solar installations—basically, everything you need other than those shiny photovoltaic panels and the inverters necessary to feed power onto the grid. They craft cable assemblies,…
