The Area Economy Is Bounty On The Vine

The Interstate 95 exits near Smithfield and Selma lure Eastern Seaboard travelers like bees to honey.

Tobacco and gifts at J.R. Plaza and fashions of every ilk at Carolina Premium Outlet Mall help prime retail sales past $1.7 billion in a county where no town exceeds 13,000 residents. Both cities benefit from Interstate 95, where nationally recognized restaurants, hotels – even a Harley-Davidson motorcycle dealership – nest with the outlet mall and discount magnets like J.R.’s Tobacco and DeWayne’s Home & Garden Showplace.

“The outlet center (in Smithfield) is a huge anchor with 80 stores and 450,000 square feet,” says Rick Childrey, president of the Greater Smithfield-Selma Chamber of Commerce. “And then J.R. in Selma does a huge business: They’re one big store with a lot of different things.”

New and expanding industries are driving the economy, too. Johnston County leaders announced capital investment plans of $175 million and 1,300 new jobs in the past 2 years. Sysco has invested nearly $40 million in a food distribution facility creating 500 jobs that pay $48,000 on average.

“I think being part of the (Research) Triangle economy absolutely is the major reason Sysco has come to Selma,” Childrey says. “They’ve seen such a huge customer growth in this part of North Carolina.”

A trio of pharmaceutical firms – Talecris Biotherapeutics, Novo Nordisk and Hospira – generate about 2,000 jobs between Smithfield and Clayton on the county’s western side.

Talecris is the largest industrial employer at 1,800 jobs. But insulin maker Novo Nordisk just finished investing $100 million and adding almost 200 jobs paying an average $57,000. And generic drug maker Hospira has begun a $15 million upgrade yielding 150 jobs at more than $37,000 a year.

Those expansions helped launch a $4 million, 30,000-square-foot Workforce Development Center in which Johnston Community College tailors training to meet emerging job demands. The county’s diversified economy includes heavy equipment manufacturer Caterpillar and 700 jobs in Smithfield and Clayton, auto supplier SONA BLW with 150 metal forging jobs in Selma, and Polymer Group Inc. with nearly 400 workers producing nonwoven materials in Benson.

Agriculture remains a vital force in Johnston County, where 2006 crop cash receipts of $145 million ranked first in the state. Johnston’s yearly yield of 18 million pounds of tobacco ranks second in the state, and its sweet potato yield – 913,000 hundredweight in 2006 – sparks Smithfield’s annual Ham & Yam Festival each May.

The Tobacco Farm Life Museum in Kenly bridges tourism and farms, offering tours to crop producers.

“We’re developing agritourism trails throughout the county to work with farmers who are selling produce and who have corn mazes,” says Donna Bailey-Taylor, the Johnston County Visitors Bureau executive director.

Near Kenly, the NASCAR-sanctioned Southern National Raceway packs in 8,000 racing fans on Saturday nights from April to November. Selma's Railroad Days draw 30,000 each October, and a recent Bentonville re-enactment of the Civil War’s last major battle drew 40,000 – part of $73 million in traditional tourism spending annually.

And for Johnston County natives seeking pearls of opportunity, the world is their oyster.

“One advantage is we’re only an hour-and-a-half to Wilmington and the beach,” says Childrey. “Or you can be in the mountains in three hours.”