Bridgestone Americas will keep building Firestone-brand race tires in Akron for a couple more years.
The Nashville-based tire maker and Akron city officials on Wednesday announced a two-year lease extension on what Bridgestone calls its Advanced Technology Workshop in the former Firestone Plant One off South Main Street in Akron. Workers there make race tires for IndyCar open-wheel racing.
The extension will keep as many as 70 highly skilled jobs in Akron through 2020, the city said.
Keeping the specialty tire plant in the city-owned building is a key part to attract and retain other businesses and could help spur future development in the area, said Sam DeShazior, Akron’s deputy mayor for economic development.
“This is sort of a boost in the arm” that Bridgestone did not decide to relocate the manufacturing plant, he said. The Bridgestone facility makes use of locally sourced materials, tools and more as part of the Akron-area automotive supply chain, he said.
“We’ll talk to [Bridgestone] about a long-term strategy to keep tires made here in Akron,” he said.
Bridgestone said it exercised an option to extend a current agreement two years. The city did not need to provide financial incentives to keep the plant, DeShazior said. The city will continue to help Bridgestone find talented employees for its Akron facilities, he said.
The city would like to see Bridgestone look at what is called “adaptive reuse” of other parts of the former Plant One, he said.
“We’d like to thank our city, county and state leaders for their continued support of Bridgestone and our investments in Northeast Ohio,” Steve Charles, vice president of Product Development for Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations, said in a statement.
“I am pleased that Bridgestone will continue to manufacture tires and retain jobs in our community,” Akron Mayor Dan Horrigan said in a news release.
Bridgestone Americas said the race tire facility “is one of the company’s most historic and unique tire production facilities in North America.”
Bridgestone has about 900 employees in Akron, including at its Americas Technical Center.
Jim Mackinnon can be reached at 330-996-3544 or jmackinnon@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow him @JimMackinnonABJ on Twitter or www.facebook.com/JimMackinnonABJ