By Dan Spalding
News Now Warsaw
WARSAW — Attracting a new start-up car manufacturer with the financial backing of Jeff Bezos — one of the richest men in the world — would be a grand slam story for almost any small community in the country.
But add to that the separate announcement of Michigan-based Autocam Medical’s decision to expand with a new orthopedic facility in Warsaw, and you have a memorable year in economic development likely unmatched in local history.
Combined, Slate Auto and Autocam Medical’s plans easily represent the biggest story of the year in Kosciusko County.
Peggy Friday, the executive director for Kosciusko County Economic Development Corp., said she thinks efforts in industrial growth merit an A+ grade.
“Landing Slate, making a case for Autocam and finding a location for them — that doesn’t just happen overnight or by chance,” Friday said. “It’s very intentional.”
KEDCO worked closely with Kosciusko County officials on an incentive plan to lock in Slate’s consideration.
Friday was hired in May of 2024 to replace KEDCO’s previous leader, Alan Tio.
“For the first year of KEDCO that I’ve been here. I think it’s been phenomenal. We have a lot to be proud of,” Friday said.
Slate is investing around $400 million over two decades to transform the former national printing plant and plans to employ upward of 1,900 people.
Autocam Medical, which became enamored with the local workforce after using part of Medtronic’s facility over the past year or so, announced plans to construct a new plant in the Warsaw Technology Park that will employ 300 people with a promise of good wages.
Slate’s arrival also checks the proverbial box in terms of working to diversify the economic base beyond orthopedics — a goal held by many local leaders who worry about relying too much on a single industry, even though medtech’s future trajectory for sustained growth continues to look bright.
Slate’s reconfiguration of the 1.4 million square foot property on Old Road 30, which began last summer, is also a huge victory in terms of reinvigorating a massive industrial property that went silent just over two years ago and could have easily fallen into decay.
The plant is expected to start making the electric pickup trucks in late 2026.
Those two instances of industrial growth also coincide with significant development in or near downtown Warsaw, much of which is expected to come to fruition in 2026.
Those include the construction of the Millworks apartment complex planned for the old Owen’s grocery store west of downtown.
Another apartment complex, this one on the site of the old Gakte property, Union Station Lofts, is currently under construction on McKinley Street just north of Winona Avenue.
Another huge investment involves Lake City Bank’s $12 million renovation of a 35,600-square-foot building west of its headquarters along Center Street for an Innovation and Technology Center.
At the same time, the Warsaw Redevelopment Commission lined up a company to significantly redevelop the old Marsh grocery store on South Buffalo Street for a future large antique mall and other proposed retail uses.
The city acquired the land for $1.25 million in hopes of somehow reinvigorating the commercial property and is now expected to eventually recover nearly all of its investment.
Renovations to the old Marsh building are expected to continue into much of 2026.
The city also pulled off a victory in convincing the owners of Hobby Lobby to build a new store in the Marketplace of Warsaw, which has been on the rebound in the past two years after officials worried it could eventually become entirely vacant.
Fans of Hobby Lobby had been hoping to see the company have a presence in Warsaw for years, and the future store should open late next year after several storefronts on the east end of the shopping center are razed to make room for new construction.
In terms of economic development, Friday said there’s more to come in 2026.
“We’re going to have a lot to celebrate in ‘26,” Friday said. “There are so many projects that are in the hopper for right now, and we look forward to the momentum that we’ve gained.”
She also points out that the recent ‘County of the Year’ from the Indiana Chamber of Commerce underscores what’s happening.
“That was just a rubber stamp that we must be doing something right,” she said.
