Company officials have hinted that the company has somehow outgrown Seattle, and that this move makes them more worldly. By that logic, would moving company headquarters to an orbital space station make them even better? It doesn’t seem obvious how it’s going to help them build better planes and rockets, and that’s really what their business is about.
— Boeing historian T.M. Sell, from a 2001 guest column in the Puget Sound Business Journal, criticizing Boeing’s decision to move its corporate headquarters to Chicago. Sell told KING5 News he believes Boeing will pay a price for deciding to open a second production line in South Carolina rather than Everett.