GM Adding 400 Jobs at Bowling Green Facility to Keep up With C8 Chevrolet Corvette Demand
The assembly plant has manufactured over one million Corvettes since it took over production in 1981 and it now prepares for a new era of the model.
General Motors is preparing to ramp up production in anticipation for its next-generation C8 Corvette by increasing its Bowling Green, Kentucky plant's workforce by nearly 45 percent.
More than one million Corvettes have been produced at GM's Bowling Green assembly plant in Kentucky since 1981, a manufacturing facility that more than 900 workers call home. GM announced on Thursday that it would add "more than 400 hourly jobs,” as well as a second shift to cover anticipated demand for the company's first mid-engine Corvette.
“The Corvette’s iconic status owes so much to the men and women of Bowling Green, where it has been built exclusively for almost 40 years,” said GM CEO Mary Barra. “This is the workforce that can deliver a next generation Corvette worthy of both its historic past and an equally exciting future, and today’s announcement gets us one step closer to its reveal on July 18.”
The C8 Corvette is set to be unveiled in its entirety on July 18, the same date which the camouflaged prototype reads alongside its door. Following the unveiling of the C8, GM will cease production of the C7 Corvette which is currently produced at the Bowling Green facility. The final production model will be auctioned off this summer and its proceeds are to benefit the Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation.
The news that GM plans to add 400 workers is one of the first economically positive announcements since the automaker said it would deallocate production from five North American plants, effectively slashing an estimated 14,000 jobs. Since 2011, GM has invested more than $900 million in its Bowling Green facility, including a new body and paint shop, increased engine building capacity, and a Performance Build Center. Its local economic impact is said to be more than $76 million in state wages and $15 million in income tax.
