Thursday, July 31, 2014
Commission Approves Expending Funds On New Marketing Tool To Attract Industry
Members of the Lawrence County Board of Commissioners have voted to expend funds that will provide them with a new marketing tool to help draw industry to the area.
The resolution was approved during the commission's regular bi-monthly business meeting Tuesday evening.
The resolution was for the county to match funds to be expended by both the City of Lawrenceburg and Lawrence County Chamber of Commerce to contract with Buxton for a three-year data study. The company, specializing in the targeted collection and analysis of data, would conduct a retail site and development study of the area, providing the entities with a marketing plan to improve quality of life in the vicinity. This, leaders hope, will make the area more attractive to industrial prospects.
The total cost for the three year contract would be $150,000 with the cost split equally between the county, city, and utilities system. This would cost them $50,000 apiece, or $16,667 per year.
Scott Franks, Chairman of the commission's Economic Development Committee explained that the company specializes in data mining. He said that the company collects data on topics such as the spending habits of the public. "This data can be used by our existing businesses to find what customers are wanting, a leakage we have, what people are going outside the county to buy...Then we can take that date to those businesses and say, 'You need to locate in Lawrence County.' It will also help us in industrial recruitment, in areas such as quality of life issues we run into when we're trying to attract industry."
Franks added, "I think this is a very proactive step that we can take."
Chamber of Commerce Director Daniel Webb addressed the commission, as well. "One of the obstacles we've continually run into in the last few years," he said, "Is the quality of life issue. It means something different to each individual, but many times what we find is that these companies and their families, what they are looking for, are shopping opportunities and dining opportunities. 'What can my family do?' That's an area we want to start trying to address."
Webb pointed out, "Every elected official wants to find a way to increase the tax base without raising taxes. To me the best opportunity for us to be able to do that is if we're attracting retail opportunities to our community."
Web told commissioners that he felt the contract would be beneficial. "What they would do initially," he said, "Is come and gather our data. From that they would identify a top 20 of retailer fits for Lawrence County. They would do a warm-up letter on our behalf and then arm us with the information to actually go and make a sales pitch to these different companies. It would be data that would be updated monthly. We would have that for three years, continually."
In addressing the commission Lawrenceburg Mayor Keith Durham pointed out that the plan has not yet been adopted by city government. "I do want to let you know up front," he pointed out, "That the city has not passed this yet. It would be a part of our budget, which we have not finished. To be honest with you I don't know the outcome. We've got a log to things this year - we've got the Babe Ruth World Series coming in and things like that, however we do feel...confident that we're going to fit this into our budget, we're just going to look at it a little bit more. We're convinced it will help the city and Lawrence County."
