Every December, the Noble County Economic Development Corp. conducts a survey of industrial employers in the county to see what their needs might be for the next year.

The ongoing business retention effort makes sense for the same reason good salespeople are attentive to their customers, said Rick Sherck, executive director for NCEDC.

"It's easier to keep a customer than it is to go out and find a new one," he said. "We grow more jobs in Noble County through the existing industries than through attraction."

This year, everyone connected with business retention in the county will be particularly attuned to the needs of a Kraft Foods Inc. plant in Kendallville that makes marshmallows, marshmallow creme, dehydrated marshmallow bits and caramel. With a work force of 410, it is among the county's largest employers.

Its ownership will be changing.

The Northfield, Ill.-based company announced last August plans for a tax-free spinoff of its $16-billion, high-margin North American grocery business into a separate public company. That will include the Kendallville plant.

The grocery business will have four "billion-dollar" brands - Kraft, Maxwell House, Oscar Mayer and Philadelphia - plus three brands that do at least $500 million in annual sales and 14 more with annual revenue exceeding $100 million.

The remaining, high-growth global business with annual revenue of about $32 billion would be focused on snacks. The spinoff will be completed by the end of the year.

In mid-January, Kraft announced consolidation of its U.S. management centers - a streamlining of its corporate and business unit organizations and realignment of its U.S. sales organization that will eliminate 1,600 positions at its North American operations this year.

Kraft said the cuts would take place primarily in its sales, corporate and business unit areas and positions now open would account for close to 20 percent of the jobs eliminated. "These planned work force reductions do not include manufacturing facilities," a prepared statement on the cuts explained. "With the impending separation into two independent companies, Kraft is continuing its review of manufacturing facilities to consider what's best for both new companies."

If the Kendallville plant comes under the company's review, economic development officials hope past efforts they have put into developing and maintaining a relationship with Kraft will help its decision makers see the city as an excellent place to do business - particularly food processing.

"We make an effort to build connections on an ongoing basis, and hopefully if they're going through some transitions, they'll reach out and call us to see if we can help," Sherck said. "On other occasions, we'll hear of something and we'll reach out to see if we can help the company as well.

"Quite often when we go to Kraft, Kendallville Mayor Suzanne Handshoe will go with us. We try to keep each other in the loop. If Kraft calls me, I let her know . and vice versa. It's a real partnership," he said.

"We're connectors of resources. We may not have the tools needed in our own organizations, but we have built an extensive toolbox of resources and we can connect them with other people and other services."

Outside resources available to the NCEDC to help with business retention include those of organizations such as the Indiana Economic Development Corp. and WorkOne Northeast as well as other service providers with expertise specific to the region.

When companies with operations in the city go through periods of consolidation or other transition, Handshoe said she considers it an opportunity to attract production work to their Kendallville facilities, and she makes "a special effort to ask if there's something I could do so we could get the growth here."

"We have a wonderful relationship with the plant manager of Kraft. He indicated these decisions for growth are made at the corporate level, so when the corporate level management is coming for a plant visit, we try to . meet with them and kind of explain some incentives we would offer," she said.

The goal is to make it clear "we want their business and we want to help them grow and what the facility means to this community," she said. "Kraft's been here over 80 years."

Kraft bought the plant in 1934 and used it to make bulk cheese, adding caramel in 1935 and discontinuing the cheese in 1936. Marshmallows and marshmallow products were added there years later.

The plant was expanded three times during the 1950s. In 2009, Kraft said it would invest $6 million converting its marshmallow creme line from glass to plastic jars and adding a roof structure to accommodate a new sugar railroad car and truck off-loading system.

Conversion of the marshmallow creme line required its extension and the installation of several pieces of equipment.

"Things went well. The improvements and investments were all completed in 2010," said Joyce Hodel, a Kraft spokeswoman.

In addition to other benefits, converting to lighter, plastic jars reduced the cost of moving the product around in the plant and transporting it. The new off-loading system was more efficient and sanitary and reduced degradation of the sugar because it ran more gently, she said. It also ran quieter.

The work included infrastructure improvements, she said. "We upgraded some of the utilities and also some of the interior walls and floors."

No information was available on when Kraft would review its manufacturing facilities or what criteria it would use for that process.

The plant is valued for its community involvement as well as the employment it provides. It recently donated $16,000 to the United Way of Noble County through employee donations and matching grants.

In April 2011, the Kraft Foods Foundation announced it had awarded $15,000 to the Community Harvest Food Bank of Northeast Indiana.

"Kraft Foods and its foundation have a long history of giving back to the community, and we're glad to do so right here in northeast Indiana, where our employees live and work," Mike Hughes, manager of the Kendallville facility, said at the time.

The plant sponsors a number of events for area schools and communities, and Hughes is involved with the United Way and is serving as board president this year for the Greater Kendallville Chamber of Commerce.

"Their plant manager is involved in the community and takes a personal interest in seeing that the plant succeeds," Handshoe said. "When they make decisions about what they're going to consolidate, I know that its being an older facility is something they're thinking about. I also know the plant manager has said it is worthy of investment."