— State lawmakers said Thursday that, while the Triangle remains in the hunt for Amazon's second headquarters, the price could wind up being too steep.

An Apple support campus, while smaller, would be an easier get, they said.

Amazon's so-called HQ2 project would be a huge prize: 50,000 jobs and $5 billion in investment. On Wednesday, lawmakers in Maryland, where a Washington, D.C., suburb is among the 20 finalists, approved an $8.5 billion incentive offer for Amazon, and New Jersey already approved a $7 billion bid.

"Those are tough numbers," said Sen. Harry Brown, R-Onslow, conceding that North Carolina has never offered an incentive package even close to that.

"But as you saw with the Toyota package, we were willing to put up a pretty good package, and I think we can compete in a lot of other areas other than money," Brown said.

North Carolina offered $1.6 billion to Toyota and Mazda to entice the car makers to build a joint auto plant in the state, but they chose Alabama instead.

The Apple project, which isn't yet the focus of a multi-state bidding war, would create 15,000 to 20,000 jobs and would ramp up more quickly than Amazon.

"I'm anxious. I'm excited. I hope they will find this an appealing area," said Sen. Floyd McKissick, D-Durham, whose district includes part of Research Triangle Park. "Certainly, when they opened the first Apple store at [Streets at] Southpoint mall, it's because of the number of Ph.D.s in this area – one of the greatest concentrations outside of Silicon Valley. We can benefit. It'd be great to see it happen."

Chris Chung, chief executive of the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina, which handles business recruitment for the state, declined to comment on either project. But he said North Carolina's workforce, education system and business climate are definitely attractive to high-profile employers.

"Compared to other states that I've been in, we get a lot more looks," Chung said. "It doesn't mean we're guaranteed the wins, but we get a lot more at bats than other states. So, some years you're going to see more of those big ones than others, but consistently we just get a lot of projects that we get to compete for."