The Challenge
Before it became a global chemical company with more than 100 manufacturing, sales, and technical sites and 7,000 employees worldwide, Lubrizol was founded in 1928 in a Cleveland garage. Nearly a century later, the Fortune 500 company invents and makes advanced materials, additives, and ingredients used in everyday products and industrial applications.
Lubrizol is still based in Northeast Ohio, where its operations are split across two campuses: the company’s world headquarters in Wickliffe and a satellite site in Brecksville. After 98 years of growth, this divide has only intensified, with more than 1,000 scientists, engineers, and staff split between the two sites, and teams that should have been working side by side were instead a drive away from each other.
With the company approaching its 100th anniversary in 2028, Lubrizol decided the time was right to construct a facility that could physically bring those teams under one roof, modernize aging labs in need of a 21st-century update, and establish a global headquarters capable of anchoring another century of growth and innovation.
The Solution
The company found that anchor in its own backyard. In January 2026, Lubrizol announced a $209 million investment in its Wickliffe headquarters, relocating Brecksville's employees and capabilities to Wickliffe and merging the two sites into a single headquarters. (Lubrizol will keep its Painesville and Avon Lake operations running as-is.)
The investment affects more than office space. It funds bigger, state-of-the-art labs, a new Lubrizol experience center, renovated cafeterias, interactive workspaces, and a multipurpose space built for meetings and events, with construction rolling out in phases through 2028.
Key Factors in Choosing Ohio:
A century of operational history in Northeast Ohio
Proximity to the University of Akron’s elite plastics research program—ranked #1 in the world
Room to physically merge two existing campuses of 1,000+ scientists and engineers without relocating out of the county
Partnerships with local officials and community leaders who prioritize business retention
Ohio’s natural gas cost advantage, which a 2022 Shale Crescent USA study found beats plastics manufacturing overseas
The Results
Economic Impact: Lubrizol is the largest employer in Lake County. The decision to consolidate rather than relocate keeps more than 1,000 jobs in Wickliffe — including the paychecks, local spending, and civic involvement that come with them. County officials have called it the largest economic development project in Lake County since JobsOhio and Team NEO were founded more than 12 years ago.
Strategic Advantage: Splitting Lubrizol's Northeast Ohio scientists and engineers across two campuses has meant splitting the connective tissue of a company whose value depends on how fast a lab discovery becomes a shipped product. Putting more than 1,000 employees under one roof is a bet that proximity itself will accelerate that pipeline.
With its 100th anniversary in 2028, Lubrizol is making this investment in the same county where it was founded, rather than treating the milestone as a reason to look elsewhere. The company is choosing to expand in a state where the economics of plastics manufacturing have shifted: a 2022 industry study found it’s no longer cheaper to import plastic-based goods than make them domestically. It’s yet another reason Lubrizol opted to deepen its roots in Northeast Ohio and continue to call it home.Â
Lubrizol’s innovation legacy began in a Cleveland garage when Lubrizol invented its first automotive solutions to lubricate leaf springs on early automobiles. Nearly a century and thousands of patents later, our extraordinary Northeast Ohio talent continues to innovate for breakthrough solutions, enabled by Lubrizol science. By uniting our teams under one roof, we’re building an even more connected and agile organization to drive lasting impact and enhance countless products that consumers across the world use every day.
— Rebecca Liebert, President and CEO, Lubrizol
