Wendy's Moving HQ to Ohio

[MathmanMathman]

Originally Posted by GoneFromGeorgia

Ohio is always ranked near or at the top for capital investments in new and expanded facilities, they have won the site selection governors cup four consecutive times and eight times overall. How many times has Georgia won? You can read peoples opinions about where they think is the most business friendly or you can look at the facts like where things are actually being built. Site selection bases their rankings on actual construction investment and jobs created. Georgia doesn't receive near the capital investment that Ohio does. Ohio has added two new fortune 500 companies this year alone with one being a fortune 100 company. Just in the last year Georgia has lost a nascar race (which moved to Kentucky Speedway within the Cincinnati Metro), an NHL team (moved to Canada for the second time), and a fortune 500 company. Ohio also has a much lower unemployment rate. Unemployment Rates for States

2010: Ohio Attracts Most Businesses For Fourth Year In a Row | Ohio Business Development Coalition (http://www.ohiomeansbusiness.com/newsroom/press-releases/single-press-release.php?id=197 - broken link)

2011: Cover Story: Texas Soars: Site Selection

Damn! Always wanted to win that Site Selection Governor's Cup. It'd look so cool in the trophy case at the Capitol Building.

Well...we did nab a Fortune 500 company, NCR, from Ohio.

[GoneFromGeorgia]

Originally Posted by MathmanMathman

Damn! Always wanted to win that Site Selection Governor's Cup. It'd look so cool in the trophy case at the Capitol Building.

Well...we did nab a Fortune 500 company, NCR, from Ohio.

Georgia would have a long way to go to win that trophy! They would have a better chance at getting a Stanley Cup. At least there is a Sprint Cup remaining, for now anyway.

[Newsboy]

This may have already been mentioned, but Wendy's was always based in Ohio and never really left even when it was bought out by Arby's parent company. So Atlanta really isn't losing anything. The company is just going back to its roots. Thread closed.

[GoneFromGeorgia]

Originally Posted by crazynip

The entire state of Ohio is dump

It's Florida that's known as the trailer park capital of the world. You know what they say about people who live in glass houses...

[JoeP]

Won't be going to Wendy's anymore.........

time to reduce my wendy's patronage

Seriously? How petty. Wendy's was born in Columbus and should have never been attached to the dead weight of Arby's. This is great for Wendy's and nice to see a company officially "live" where it's from.

Also, while I've only been to Columbus a few times, it's a nice city and has some really great areas.

[Galounger]

Originally Posted by residinghere2007

Being from Ohio originally I am actually excited for the state to have them back (but like a PP said I never really believed that they were truly headquartered here in GA anyway).

And regardless what some walkability score would say, Columbus is much more walkable than Atlanta. There are sidewalks on all the streets in all major cities in Ohio, to me sidewalks equal walkability. It is very crazy that in the city of Atlanta there aren't many sidewalks and the ones that are here are not taken care of very well. Most have weeds growing out of them up to my waist. You rarely see that in Ohio. I have lived in 3 cities there.

Wendy's also may be receiving a lot better tax incentive as well. The last company I worked for in Ohio, because of the economic situation there (very high jobless rate), offered the company a very lucrative tax incentive where they did not pay hardly any local or state taxes at all since the community wanted to lure jobs to the area. Their plan worked.

I lived in Columbus for years and while it's true Ohio towns in general have more sidewalks than Georgia towns, because they are older and therefore built more pedestrian friendly, Columbus was far from being one of the most walkable towns in my opinion. And I really should know as I didn't own a car when in Columbus. I lived up on Morse Road for a while which is one of the more suburban parts of Columbus. It Dublin-Granville Road and Schrock Road (where I also lived) were terrible places to have to walk especially in the winter when snowy and icy sidewalks may force you to either walk into the street or wind up with a ice, mud, and salt slush all over your pants legs and shoes. Now I also lived in the Ohio State area and it is far more walkable than the others but still no more walkable than Georgia Tech area and certainly not more than the Georgia State area. Also the city proper of Columbus is even more spread out than that of Atlanta's and they are only served by bus where as in Atlanta in many places you can get where you want a lot quicker taking the Marta train.

Far as Wendys moving to Atlanta, that doesn't even seem right in the first place. Wendys' to me is as synonymous with Columbus as Waffle House is with Atlanta. (They certainly seemed to have a Wendy's on almost every corner like Waffle Houses in Atlanta) and I always thought that guy Dave Thomas the restaurants founder and present on most commercials before he passed was from Dublin or somewhere in the Columbus Area.

Edit: I just checked google map of the areas of Columbus I once lived and man did it take me back down memory lane. One thing I had forgot about though was that practically none of Schrock Road had any sidewalk and much of Morse Road and Dublin-Granville had none either. They did have access roads that could be easily walked on when traffic wasn't too heavy but when you had to get out of the road to let traffic by there was that dirty snow you had to trudge through again. Still I had some good times up there. It was my college years and I guess I will always think fondly of them and Columbus.