BLS & Co. advised Colgate Palmolive on behalf of a new personal care products manufacturing plant in Greenwood, South Carolina. The initial search geography included the southeastern and mid-Atlantic United States. BLS & Co.'s energy services group performed infrastructure due diligence on the preferred site, identifying several critical issues to be remedied. The incentive package was comprised of various tax credits for job creation, investment, and port usage; a closing fund grant award; sales and use tax exemptions, training assistance, and property reductions.
BLS & Co. provided incentives advisory services for SKF USA Inc.’s new Global Technical Center – Americas (GTCA), an engineering research and development center supporting SKF’s North and South American manufacturing operations. Naperville, IL -- a suburb of Chicago – was chosen for the 130,000 square foot build-to-suit facility.
BLS & Co. and its energy services affiliate, Sugarloaf Associates, identified nine "Data Center Qualified Sites" for American Electric Power (NYSE: AEP), one of the nation's largest utilities. After a comprehensive review of locations across AEP's 11-state territory, BLS & Co. qualified sites with reliable and redundant power supply, strong fiber networks, low disaster risks and a business-friendly climate.
The team designed a three-phase evaluation process that analyzed the electric supply and capacity, access to long and short-haul fiber providers, water availability, electric costs, tax exemptions and incentives, demographics, vendor/supplier networks and the ability to complete construction within 18 months.
As an extra step, a third-party engineering company, Intelligent Building Systems (IBS), modeled each site's ability to accommodate a 100,000-square-foot raised-floor data center designed to current industry specifications.
When Roche required assistance to fast-track a decision on the location of its new Translational Clinical Research Center (TCRC), the company engaged BLS & Co. to secure incentives in support of this elite research early development organization. After a thorough site selection process, the company chose the build-to-suit Alexandria Center on Manhattan’s east side for its new facility.
Panasonic's North American headquarters in Secaucus, NJ no longer met the company's objectives for talent, energy efficiency and branding.
BLS & Co. was engaged to evaluate multiple destinations for the headquarters, both in the NY / NJ metro area as well as locations in CA, IL and GA where the company has surplus real estate capacity.
BLS & Co. was successful in securing a package of state and local incentives in connection with Panasonic’s decision to anchor a new Class A office tower in downtown Newark, including an Urban Transit Hub Tax Credit award and local grants through the Redevelopment Area Bond program.
Panasonic now occupies 10 floors of the 12-story building at Two Riverfront Plaza, Newark’s first new office building in more than 20 years. Designed to achieve Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) gold certification for new construction and LEED platinum certification for interiors, the project is bringing 1,000 new employees into Newark’s downtown, and provides the catalyst for development of new retail, hospitality and other amenities in the city’s central business district.
CoreNet Global recognized the Panasonic project team with a 2013 Economic Development Leadership Award for spurring economic development, investment and employment in the Brick City.
BLS & Co. crafted land use and community engagement strategies to assist Hercules with the disposition of 2,100 acres of brownfields in New Jersey. The engagement involved strategies to reposition and/or redevelop four sites on a portfolio basis, quickly enabling sale of the most market-ready property to generate the resources needed to pursue the redevelopment potential of the longer-lead sites.
BLS & Co.'s efforts focused on an affirmative, inclusive community/intervenor strategy to define the benefits associated with redevelopment, including demonstrating the fiscal and economic impacts of a market-based approach to re-use of the sites. BLS & Co. also managed an RFP process to identify and select the most qualified bidders for the sites, then managed the transaction that resulted in the sale of a 100-acre property in Burlington, New Jersey which has since been redeveloped with over 1 million square feet of modern warehouse space.
BLS & Co. secured an incentives package for AeroFarms for its headquarters and R&D operation on a three-acre site in Newark, NJ, developed by the RBH Group. AeroFarms is the largest indoor aeroponic farm in the world, growing up to two million pounds per year of leafy greens in a safe, sanitary and environmentally controlled facility.
BLS & Co. served as financial advisor for a groundbreaking cooperative venture between the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa and Merck to secure public financing to create over 300,000 square feet of life-sciences oriented development on a 25-acre site.
Moffitt created a wholly owned subsidiary called M2Gen to implement the project, which began with the construction of a 50,000 square foot facility that will house labs and related facilities focused on revolutionizing the way cancer is diagnosed and treated.
BLS & Co. conceptualized the incentives package for the project and managed the analysis, negotiations, structuring, approvals and documentation of the public financing. The public financing package constituted more than one-fourth the total project capitalization.
Goya Foods is the premier provider of authentic Latino and Caribbean cuisine. BLS & Co. advised the company as it sought to address capacity constraints at its New Jersey headquarters and distribution facility.
BLS & Co. secured an award under the Urban Transit Hub Tax Credit program to support the project, which will include the creation of over 100 new jobs and the retention of over 300 existing jobs.
BLS & Co. conducted a comparison of warehouse labor markets in Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia to help inform Avon's location decision-making.
We examined labor supply, demand, quality, and cost indicators including present and projected population levels, unemployment rates, education attainment, unionization, wage and income levels.
BLS & Co. and its principals have provided ongoing site selection and incentives advisory services to QVC, including warehouse and call center location projects in North America and Europe. Our most recent engagement for QVC resulted in a 1 million square foot distribution center (expandable to 2 million square feet) in Florence, South Carolina.
BLS & Co. managed a multi-state, sequential site search, and secured incentives for the project, including free land, infrastructure grants, ad valorem tax abatements, job development grants, job tax credits, and sales tax exemptions.
In addition, BLS expedited permitting and as a result, the warehouse was able to open ahead of schedule.
Since our first project with Eli Lilly and Company (“Lilly”) in 2008, BLS & Co. has served as strategic advisor on multiple site selection and incentives advisory projects throughout the company’s real estate portfolio, involving over $8 billion in planned investment and 3,000 in announced new positions.
Project Highlights
BLS was pleased to work with MycoWorks, a producer of a biomaterial made from mycelium, on the site selection for their first commercial-scale plant. The finished product is used to make consumer products such as luxury bags, luggage, shoes and other apparel from a sustainable and renewable “leather substitute” material. After a national search for suitable locations to meet operating requirements and other siting criteria, a location was selected and announced in March 2022 in Union, South Carolina. BLS also assisted MycoWorks in the negotiation of a competitive incentives package from both Union County and the South Carolina Department of Commerce.
An existing 100k SF spec building was fitted out to the company’s operational needs, and a 30,000 SF office was added on to the building to house corporate operational functions as well as plant management. The estimated total investment is $100 million. MycoWorks officially began production in the new facility in October 2023 with plans to hire 130 employees.
As sustainability in the manufacturing process was important to the company, BLS also provided negotiation support for renewable energy purchases for the South Carolina facility, as well as Renewable Energy Credits (RECS) for another facility the client operates in California.
Bank of New York (BNY) Mellon had multiple near-term lease expirations across three states, requiring review of a wide range of location options to consolidate operations and reduce costs.
Other states offered significant "new job" incentives to attract BNY Mellon, but New Jersey was ill-equipped to save its existing jobs. BLS & Co. initiated a campaign to create a new "retention" incentive for New Jersey, beginning with a "white paper" on its policy merits, and organized a coalition of business and government leaders to promote the new legislation.
The new program - Business Retention & Relocation Grant (BRRAG) - provided transferable tax credits for large projects, and premium incentives for projects relocating to urban centers. The legislature adopted BRRAG in time for BNY Mellon's location decision.
BLS & Co. was engaged to devise an incentives strategy for ACE Limited (now Chubb) in support of their consolidation and relocation of back office operations from New York City to Jersey City, New Jersey.
As part of the package, ACE was approved for a New Jersey BEIP grant and an exemption from sales tax on construction materials and equipment purchases.
BLS & Co. worked with Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) on two projects: a New Jersey-based incentives advisory and a Florida-based site selection.
BLS & Co. developed and executed the incentives strategy to facilitate the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation’s (DTCC) move from Lower Manhattan to Jersey City, New Jersey. DTCC’s migration and ongoing operations in New Jersey were financed, in part, by the EDA’s Business Employment Incentive Program (BEIP). DTCC also became the first beneficiary of the Economic Redevelopment and Growth (ERG) Grant program.
In 2002, the “Fed White Paper” challenged the financial industry to make the investments required to assure continuity and liquidity in capital markets. For the Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation (DTCC), this challenge gave rise to an intensive confidential site search that scrutinized multiple markets over six months. The search ultimately concluded in Tampa, where the collaboration of state, county and city commitments made a material difference in off-setting project costs.
The approved incentives included the Governor’s Closing Fund and new city and county programs created for this project. BLS & Co. also advised the client on integration and restructuring of its pre-existing incentives agreement in NYC into its overall redeployment and diversification of operations to Florida.
Our New Jersey incentives advisory project resulted in:
Our Florida site selection project resulted in: