This year marks the tenth anniversary of the ground breaking for the Blue Springs, MS manufacturing plant of Toyota. This plant, which has been in operation for the past five years will celebrate this anniversary in a new way which will be to open a new visitor and interactive training center at the facility that will offer public tours to let people see how the 2,000 employees are able to produce the Corolla models we enjoy on the road today. This new visitor center will cost nearly $10 million but will certainly be worth the investment to showcase what this plant is capable of.
Once this visitor center is operational, guided tours will be offered to let visitors see the Toyota Production System at work. This new visitor center is expected to begin being constructed in late 2018 with a completion date of the middle of 2019. The center will be approximately 15,000 square feet in size and offer the ability for those who want to take a tour and see this impressive location at work to be able to do so. This doesn’t mean you have to wait until 2019 for a tour of the plant, these tours will actually begin later this year and be able to accommodate as many as twelve people at a time.
Not only will the addition of the visitor center be a milestone for this Toyota plant, but the one-millionth Corolla will roll of the line later this year as a car that marks a spot in the history of this plant. This is just one location in the past several decades that Toyota has invested in which has accounted for more than $22 billion in investments already. In 2015 the data showed that Toyota has a total US employment impact of 470,100 jobs between direct, indirect and spin-off employment.
While the building of the visitor center is a great way to show community involvement and let us see more of what Toyota is doing in Blue Springs, MS there are more ways that Toyota is working to invest in the community through programs that will help build a future. Recently a $175,000 gift was given to the National Center for Families Learning to create a Toyota Family Learning program in Tupelo. Another equal donation was given to the Mississippi BEST Robotics program at Mississippi State University to promote the improvement of Engineering Science and Technology.
There’s no doubt that Toyota has a strong community foothold in Mississippi and has invested in this location to be able to be one of the most impressive partners in the area. If you’re looking for a fun tour and to see what manufacturing has become over the past several years, come check out this facility and visit the new visitors center once it’s completed. This could be an educational tour of the Toyota facility for you and your kids to enjoy a visit to a place that offers the advancements you want to see.
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