This is a simple cut-and-paste of the core contents of the "Toledo Region Brand Story 1.0" from Toledo Region Story: Brand deliverables, file AS_ToledoRegion_BrandStory_061610.pdf.
While the story is nicely broken down into different slides/pages in the PDF, I think it is also useful to have it all in a single page. This helps me understand it better.
Heart of the New Manufacturing Economy
For those who think this nation is no longer an industrial or manufacturing powerhouse, think again. In America, a new industrial revolution is beginning. And it’s standing everything you thought you knew about manufacturing on its head. It’s every bit as smart and digital as Silicon Valley software development. In fact, it incorporates software development. It incorporates open source product development and other nimble new ways of doing business, too. And it responds to individual customer and community needs with remarkable sensitivity.
In fact, this New Manufacturing Economy showcases American imagination and ingenuity—too often regarded as in short supply —at its best.
The revolution is taking place all over. But not every region is equally aware of it, equally ready to reap its rewards, or equally committed to making this revolution all it can be. Among those handful that are, one region stands out: a slice of Northwestern Ohio that’s centered around Toledo. A region that’s been at the heart of industrial activity since the time it was founded as a terminus of the Miami & Erie Canal, then as a key railway center between New York and Chicago, and then as a cornerstone of the automobile industry.
With so much in place as a center of the nation’s earlier manufacturing economy, it’s no surprise the region is poised to become the capital of the New Manufacturing Economy.
The Toledo Region is taking its place at the forefront of this new economy because it has manufacturing in its DNA. Think of the region as possessing the very best of the manufacturing mindset. It’s ingrained in the business community, upheld by the universities, and proudly embraced by the region’s people in general.
The new industrial revolution, the days of centralized command and control are drawing to a close. The New Manufacturing Economy is distinctly entrepreneurial in spirit. The Toledo Region recognizes and celebrates this spirit—and goes to great lengths to nurture it.
From research to design to manufacturing and logistics, the region supports a business model so efficient it can seem downright plug-and-play for business builders and leaders. As an entrepreneur, the conclusion is clear: Here you’ll find everything you need to accelerate your opportunity.
Talent? Here. Capital? Here. Networks? Here. Universities powering business growth at its core with relevant education, imaginative programs and farsighted partnerships? You’ll find them here, too.
To listen to all the Toledo Region has to offer, you might envision a landscape of limitless commerce parks and relentless pavement. And there, again, you’d be entirely mistaken. The very same confluence of river and lake that made the region a transportation and logistics hub in the very beginning also make it a scenic and recreational jewel today, if anything more celebrated cherished now than ever.
With mile upon mile of shorelines, islands and riverbanks shaping the terrain almost wherever you turn, the Toledo Region abounds in striking geographies and abundant nature. More species of freshwater fish and birds make their home here than just about anywhere else in the nation, and an impressive string of parks and reserves makes all this wildlife readily accessible.
Generations of the region’s residents and their neighbors recognized their region’s rare combination of opportunity and beauty and made the commitment to strike deep, lasting roots here. The cultural and social investments they made, and the distinctive neighborhoods and communities they created, remain to welcome new generations today.
For people looking for a true sense of belonging in an era of upheaval and change, the Toledo Region extends a particular welcome. Here, the remarkable combination of affordability and accessibility that one finds only at rare moments and places converges to create a quality of life that others can only dream of.
And that’s entirely right for a region that will attract and retain the best talents from elsewhere as well as within as the heart of the New Manufacturing Economy, where good ideas can reach global proportions, and life can be good every step of the way.
Some other pages that have done the same thing:
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