| Louisville, Ky. (August 12, 2024) – Greater Louisville Inc. hosted nine national site selectors from varied industries for its annual Familiarization “FAM” Tour presented by LG&E KU Energy. The two-day immersive tour included presentations from local governments and municipalities from across the 15-county region, a tour of UPS Healthcare, overviews from regional utility partners, stops at local restaurants and attractions, and more.
The trip culminated with Looking at Lou, a panel discussion among all nine site selectors, GLI’s VP of Economic Development, Clark Welch, and regional business and community leaders. Site selectors shared their biggest takeaways from their experience in Greater Louisville including:
- Regionalism is a best practice, and Greater Louisville is doing regionalism exceptionally well compared to other markets.
- Greater Louisville’s affordability, availability of land, favorable tax climate, and investment in infrastructure and site preparation through programs like Kentucky’s Productive Development Initiative (KPDI) and Indiana’s Regional Economic Acceleration & Development Initiative (READI), are major advantages as the coasts become more expensive and restrictive to growth.
- Access to workforce, logistics capabilities, and strong quality of life are the top criteria companies use when determining where to expand and relocate. Louisville excels in all three which is very attractive for a variety of industries.
- The region’s major employers like UPS and GE Appliances are doing important work to grow the advanced manufacturing and healthcare ecosystems, which is aligning the region to be the next biosciences hub.
- Greater Louisville should continue investing in talent attraction through Live in Lou and workforce development initiatives, like the JCPS Academies of Louisville, which will yield long-term results. The region should also consider implementing incentives to attract high-caliber talent to fill skilled jobs.
- GLI should amplify quality of life and cultural assets, like the region’s world-renowned culinary scene, arts, and amenities, in storytelling.
“Every year, FAM Tour and Looking at Lou provide invaluable relationship building opportunities and insights into the minds of leading site selectors, which helps us tailor our regional economic development strategy,” said Sarah Davasher-Wisdom, president and CEO of Greater Louisville Inc. “We received overwhelmingly positive feedback which makes me optimistic that we can convert our two-day tour into new projects in our regional pipeline and create transformational investment.”
| FAM Tour is part of GLI’s regional business attraction and expansion strategy to build relationships with national site selectors and keep Louisville top of mind for companies expanding their footprint. Site selectors are consultants hired to navigate a business’ relocation or expansion search, helping companies pick the location most beneficial to that company. As the regional economic development organization and manager of the Greater Louisville Partnership, GLI sells the 15-county region with the goal of bringing in leads for local governments and municipalities to negotiate incentives and work through the development process.
The Greater Louisville Partnership represents 15 diverse counties and municipalities in Kentucky and Southern Indiana, that invest in the regional model for marketing and leads. GLI manages the regional project pipeline which at the end of the second quarter included 72 projects, with the potential to generate over 8,200 new jobs and $3.8 billion in investments. This is a conservative estimate, as many companies disclose the amount in investments and job numbers late in the process. Among the active projects, 43 represented attraction projects and 29 represented expansion projects. |
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