Webster Area Development CorporationWebster, South Dakota

OVERVIEW: Webster Area Development Corporation (WADC) incorporated as a non-profit organization in 1994. Flooding in the area created a need to help drive the local prosperity and promote growth and economic activity in Day County. The organizational goal is to grow the regional economy through industrial expansion and entrepreneurship. WADC acquired local financing to purchase the former Vo-Tech building on Main Street, with grant funding being used to renovate the building as the Lake Region Business Center. Webster Area Development Corporation also established an industrial park with businesses that utilize each other’s resources to manufacture goods. This integrated concept has provided ancillary services to reduce outsourcing.

SERVICES AND CLIENTS: Funding for the organization comes from Day County and the cities of Webster, Bristol, Roslyn and Waubay. The group provides regional economic development services, including job creation, information for expanding and relocating companies and buildings and sites available in Day County, and more.

CLIENT SPOTLIGHT: One of the Webster projects aided by the Capital Investment Fund is Dakota Tube, whose Webster facility employed 28 people at the beginning of 2010. Within two years, the company grew to 32 employees, resulting in the decision to add a weekend shift. Webster Area Development Corporation (WADC) promoted Dakota Tube’s workforce expansion in 2012 successfully through various tactics including media coverage, print and online promotion and more. WADC hosted two walk-in interview days at the new Lake Region Business Center along with designing, printing and distributing posters across northeastern South Dakota; coordinating professional printing of banners to display on Main Street, SD Highway 12 and the Business Center; and posts on Facebook and Twitter accounts for WADC, Webster SD, and Day County Jobs. Overall, 43 posts reached an estimated 4480 views on Facebook during the months of May through December. Dakota Tube and Webster Area Development Corporation recently announced that the company now employs 45 people in Webster.

Borrower Profile

FOR INFORMATION visit www.dakotaresources.org, call 605-978-2804 or email beth@dakotaresources.org