More than 2,600 of those new workers are at the Chicago Assembly Plant, one of the Calumet Region's largest employers. The 2.8 million-square-foot factory on the Calumet River has been running a full three shifts to keep up with demands for the hot-selling Explorer, which was America's top-selling midsize SUV for the fourth straight year in 2014.
Ford sold 14,995 Explorers in January, a 28 percent increase. Sales of the Police Interceptor version of the Explorer also were up 83 percent in January.
Explorer sales have continued to rise steadily month after month, Ford U.S. Sales Analyst Erich Merkle said.
"It's the best January since 2005," Merkle said. "The Explorer behaves a little differently than other vehicles in the industry, in that we're able to sell what we can produce. We have to make more in order to sell more. It's a good problem to have."