Cabarrus County is home to a diverse and sophisticated economy with top industries in sectors such as advanced manufacturing, distribution, bio technology and life sciences, and high-performance motorsports racing.

The community’s advantages in cost, taxes, proximity to major markets and quality of life form a potent combination for new business investment and expansion in the heart of the one of the nation's most vibrant economic regions. “We are bringing motorsports businesses here because almost all of the top NASCAR teams are based in Cabarrus County,” says John Cox, president and chief executive officer of the Cabarrus Economic Development Corp. “We have the infrastructure and venues in place for them. We also are growing our life sciences cluster with the opening of the North Carolina Research Campus, and we also continue to have tourism be a growing and significant part of our economy.”

The county, part of the Charlotte metropolitan region, works to keep its manufacturing sector thriving as well, helping new and existing companies retool their processes to be greener and more energy efficient. Those factors, coupled with a strong service sector, form a solid backbone for growth now and in the future.

In January 2010, for example, Charlotte-based Celgard announced a $90 million expansion project for Concord in Cabarrus County, an investment that will create 300 jobs. Celgard develops and produces battery separators used in lithium-ion batteries, which power everything from laptop computers and mobile telephones to digital cameras and tools.

S&D Coffee has been a fixture in Cabarrus County since its founding in the 1920s. The Concord-based provider of an expanding line of coffee and coffee-related drinks and products is always seeking new opportunities, but with the idea of adding them to its operations in Cabarrus County, says Ron Hinson, president and CEO. “In the next few years, we’ll be looking at putting a larger facility here,” Hinson says. “We want to stay here; it would be just as easy for us to build a multipurpose facility anywhere else, but this is our home.”

Global telecommunications company ACN has also developed some deep roots in the region since establishing its world headquarters in Concord a few years ago, says Greg Provenzano, president and co-founder. “We simply couldn’t think of a better home than Concord,” Provenzano says. ACN employs close to 500 people in Concord, with more than 340 of those jobs being created since May 2008.

"The great things we already have here help us to constantly attract other new companies," Cox says. Major initiatives include replacing a 2.5 million-square-foot Philip Morris facility with new industries and enterprises. “We have companies that want to stay here, and to locate here, not just for quality of life but because they can be near major research centers,” Cox says. “We have so many different types of research and development going on here that they really have become recruitment centers in their own right."

The region is home base for Southgate Masonry and Lumber, a family owned company that is one of the county’s biggest cheerleaders. “From a business standpoint, we have diversity, a wide variety of businesses and industries that we’ve been able to grow, but it’s also a great place to live in terms of quality of life,” says Dakeita Vanderburg-Johnson, co-owner. “Our economic development officials and local governments are still reinventing us so that we can have even more diversity here, which is why so many of us want to do business and also make our home here.”