Enlarge David Schaper/NPR
Most of these electric cars on the Think factory floor in Elkhart, Ind., are finished and ready to go, waiting to be sold. Some are merely waiting to be delivered to their new owners.
David Schaper/NPR
Most of these electric cars on the Think factory floor in Elkhart, Ind., are finished and ready to go, waiting to be sold. Some are merely waiting to be delivered to their new owners.
Elkhart, Ind., is known as the RV capital of the world. The city suffered badly when the recession hit, and demand for recreational vehicles all but screeched to a halt. That's when local and state leaders started looking for ways to bolster the area's manufacturing industry.
Eventually, the unemployment rate in the city along the Michigan border soared to 20 percent — the highest in the nation at the time.
Electric cars were supposed to help revive Elkhart's economy. President Obama visited twice, promising stimulus funds to spark a new economic engine in electric vehicles. Those jobs never materialized. But like other hard-hit factory towns in the Midwest, Elkhart is starting to improve. And its RV industry is leading the way.
A Car Factory With 2 Employees
From the outside, Elkhart's Think Electric Vehicle factory looks deserted. There isn't a single car in the parking lot; the doors are all locked; the windows are dark.
It's not until you wander all the way around to the back of the 200,000-square-foot facility that there is a sign of life: one door left slightly ajar. Inside, several dozen brightly colored tiny electric cars sit in neat rows.
"All these cars are finished," says Rodney Smith, plant supervisor for Think EV. Pointing at cars that are painted red, blue and black, he says, "They're all finished and ready to go; we could hop in one of these and go down the road right now."
Enlarge David Schaper/NPR
Supervisor Rodney Smith is one of only two workers still working at the Think electric car plant in Elkhart.
David Schaper/NPR
Supervisor Rodney Smith is one of only two workers still working at the Think electric car plant in Elkhart.
There are about 120 of these road-ready models, called the Think City — a little two-seat fully electric coupe that has a range of about 100 miles before it needs to be recharged.
"It's fun to work on," Smith says of the City car. "They're good little cars. They run great."
But at the plant, there are 32 more cars that are not yet fully assembled, he says. They're waiting for parts to come in; as components arrive, Smith and another worker finish putting the cars together.
"That's currently what we're doing; we're just in a standby position," he says. "We're continuing to sell cars. We're continuing to produce cars. It's just the two of us that are here."
That's right — just two employees are working in this auto plant. At its peak, the plant employed 25 workers. Then two waves of layoffs dropped the payroll down to just two people. It's a far cry from the more than 400 people the Think company promised it would hire two years ago.
Betting On A Boom In Electric Cars
Backed by federal stimulus funding, state development grants, and tax credits, Think announced plans to produce thousands of electric cars in Elkhart annually.
Other companies lined up to make electric cars and trucks, and their parts, too, as Elkhart County, a place long known for producing gas-guzzling recreational vehicles, set out to jump-start its flat-lining economy with electric vehicles.
Since 2000, Elkhart County's average yearly jobless rate rose to nearly 20 percent; it remains above national levels. A look at annual rates:
Source: Indiana Dept. of Workforce Development/U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Credit: Nelson Hsu, NPR
During his State of the State address in 2010, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels said, "Our goal is to be the capital of this potentially massive industry of tomorrow."
But two years later, Elkhart's electric buzz has gone all but bust. Two local electric startup companies never got off the ground. Navistar is manufacturing short-range electric delivery trucks, but not yet at the level the company had hoped.
And the Think plant has delivered only about 200 electric cars, many of them to government fleets. The parent company, Think Global of Norway, filed for bankruptcy last summer.
"The results were not anywhere what they thought they would be," says Elkhart Mayor Dick Moore. "We were looking at investment of, I think, $4.5 million in real property, about $55 million in personal property, and 415 jobs. None of that has taken place."
Even those interested in driving small and quiet electric vehicles have concerns about the battery life and range, as well as the cost. The Think cars are rather expensive for such a tiny little thing — more than $40,000, before government tax credits and incentives.
"Perhaps we as Americans just can't get over the enjoyment, the love that we have to get behind the wheel of a big powerful automobile,"
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