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. 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 modeled each site's ability to accommodate a 100,000-square-foot raised-floor data center designed to current industry standards.

BLS/Sugarloaf also completed an analysis of sites in 2 states for AEP data center / operations facility.  The team review the infrastructure, both manmade and natural disaster risks and the proximity of service providers to support a data center.

BLS & Co served as site selection and incentives consultant for Omnicom Group Inc. in support of the company’s competitive location decision-making process for targeted functions to be relocated out of New York City.

BLS & Co. advised Omnicom on evaluation of alternative relocation strategies to maximize savings and minimize operational disruption by redeploying selected operations to be co-located with related functions in cities where the company has successful operating experience and excess real estate capacity. Ultimately, the incentives package from the State of New Jersey was sufficient to induce the company to relocate nearly 500 jobs to Jersey City.  Omnicom considered locations in Connecticut, Texas, Ohio and Costa Rica before selecting New Jersey.

Prudential employs more than 4,800 people in the City of Newark where the Company occupies more than 1.8 million square feet of space. With several of its leases in the City set to expire the Company commenced a comprehensive evaluation of its Newark occupancy to identify the optimal location strategy.

BLS & Co. advised Prudential on the role of incentives in its overall location strategy, and ultimately secured approval of an Urban Transit Hub Tax Credit award in support of the construction of a proposed new facility and the creation of new high-compensation positions.  The project, which will result in a redevelopment of an entire city block, represents the single largest project in Newark in a generation.  

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.

BLS & Co. advised Gartner on a headquarters location and incentives strategy, enabling the renewal of its lease in Stamford, Connecticut. Our firm secured incentives, utilizing the Urban and Industrial Site Reinvestment Tax Credit, DECD direct assistance, sales tax exemption and property tax abatement.

BLS & Co. also conducted a comprehensive evaluation of location options in multiple markets, including Columbus, GA and Jackson, MS, to accommodate Gartner’s growing space requirements for their operations in Ft. Myers, FL. Gartner ultimately decided to lease a newly constructed 120,000 sf facility adjacent to its existing building in Florida.

BLS & Co. served as site selection and incentives consultant for Bristol-Myers Squibb's new North American Capability Center (NACC) in Tampa, FL. BMS’ goal for the NACC was to house key enterprise services—technology, finance, and accounting—together with research and analytics, and to do so in a cost-effective market. The NACC project required BLS & Co. to identify and prove out low-cost, yet high-quality, markets with diverse pools of talent.

BLS & Co. managed a team of brokers, designers, and the company’s own human resource, technology, and function heads during an engagement that resulted in the successful site selection, incentive agreement, staffing, and opening of the NACC—all within a nine-month window.

Our firm also served as site selection and incentives consultant during a complex and highly competitive nationwide search for the location of a new $750 million, large-scale multi-product bulk biologics facility in Devens, MA. The facility (the largest capital investment in BMS history) supports the production of ORENCIA (R), the company's biologic therapy for rheumatoid arthritis.

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. 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.

Subaru, which had outgrown its space in Cherry Hill, NJ, hired BLS & Co. to evaluate locations for a new ground-up headquarters and service engineering center.  After considering sites in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, the firm chose to locate adjacent to the Campbell Gateway District in Camden, NJ. 

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.

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BLS & Co. was engaged by Kuehne + Nagel, a global transport and logistics company, to provide site selection services for a planned new operation and training facility.  After a nationwide search, Kuehne + Nagel decided to locate its first-ever Operational Care Center (OCC) and Career Development Program in downtown Detroit.  The office will employ nearly 200 people by 2021.

BLS & Co. secured an incentives package for Nestlé Waters North America Inc, relocating its North American headquarters from Greenwich to Stamford, CT. The Stamford location meets the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design® (LEED) standards for green buildings.

To help fund the project, BLS & Co. secured an incentives package comprising of low-interest loans, state tax credits and tax exemptions.

Eby-Brown engaged BLS & Co. to provide incentives advisory services for a new distribution center/warehouse facility to service customers in the Midwest and Mid-South regions of the United States.

The company short-listed locations in Kentucky and Indiana, and BLS & Co. secured competitive incentive offers for locations in both states. The company selected a location in Shepherdsville, KY to construct a 300,000 SF build-to-suit lease-back facility. 

BLS & Co. secured an incentives package for Eby-Brown, a wholesale distributor for the convenience store industry. The company engaged BLS & Co. to provide incentives advisory services for a potential relocation to Indiana or Tennessee from its awkward, outdated layout in Naperville, IL. The company ultimately elected to remain in the Chicago area, securing a new, state-of-the-art space in Naperville.

BLS & Co. worked with the Philadelphia Inquirer to secure an incentives package for the retention of its headquarters in Center City.

BLS & Co. was successful in restructuring the RCAP incentives program as well as securing low interest rate financing through Philadelphia Industrial Development Corporation.

BLS has represented Citigroup on projects throughout North America for over 20 years. Starting with Citi’s initial presence in Tampa, BLS developed and implemented incentives strategies in support of diverse projects, ranging from data centers to enterprise services facilities, across a broad footprint, including Florida, Texas, Ohio, New York and New Jersey.

Most recently, BLS has supported Citi on a multi-phased portfolio optimization process in the NY Metro area, including multiple incentives transactions, ongoing monitoring of legislation and regulations, and intervention in policy making.  BLS also represented Citi in securing incentives in support of its recent decision to expand in the Tampa market.