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. has represented Barr Pharmaceuticals in connection with multiple relocation and expansion projects in New Jersey. BLS & Co. secured incentives for the relocation and growth of its corporate operations from Pomana, New York to Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey.

Later, Barr relocated its Woodcliff Lake operations into a larger built-to-suit facility in Montvale, New Jersey and committed to the growth of additional jobs. BLS & Co. secured additional incentives for this project.

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.

BLS & Co. advised New York Life on the relocation of approximately 1,000 employees from the company’s Manhattan headquarters location to a new facility in Westchester, New York.

BLS & Co. was successful in securing an economic development incentive package that included a PILOT (Payment in Lieu of Taxes), sales tax exemptions on construction materials and FF&E purchases, a state capital grant and a discount of the utility bills.

BLS & Co. represented Fanatics, the leading sports merchandise licensing and ecommerce company, in siting its second fulfillment and light manufacturing center in Frazeysburg, Ohio. The company was experiencing rapid growth, but had continued to process all of its orders from a single fulfillment center located in Florida. In order to maximize efficiency and lower costs while maintaining Fanatic's commitment to fast and reliable delivery, the Company sought to expand its fulfilment network.

During an approximately 6-month engagement, BLS & Co. conducted a comprehensive, multi-state site selection effort focusing on such factors as available real estate, ability to attract and retain labor, comprehensive cost modeling, and incentives. BLS & Co. then helped the company secure an Ohio Jobs Creation Tax Credit and a forgivable equipment lease financing.

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. serves as location and incentives advisor to biotechnology industry leader Genentech, the South San Francisco-based member of the Roche Group.  Genentech develops, manufactures and commercializes medicines to treat patients worldwide with serious medical conditions.  During our most recent engagement for Genentech, BLS & Co. managed a nationwide search for a second location for their Access Solutions Patient Service Center.  Access Solutions employees help patients understand their insurance benefits; find ways to help those who cannot afford their Genentech medicines; and work with doctors and pharmacists to deliver medicines to patients.  With the advice and guidance of the firm, Genentech selected Portland, OR for this mission critical operation, which opened for business in May 2019. The new Portland Patient Access Center employs approximately 175 full-time specialists and an almost equal number of contingent employees during the peak insurance benefit open season. The firm also advised Genentech on an Oregon Business Retention Program (BEP) grant and various market-entry strategies.

BLS & Co. was engaged by Mead Johnson Nutritionals, following its spinoff by Bristol-Myer Squibb, to advise the company on the choice of destination for its new executive offices.

BLS & Co. managed a multi-market comparative analysis in North America that ultimately resulted in the relocation of the company's leadership tier to a new Class A office space in Glenview, IL (suburban Chicago).

The firm also secured an EDGE grant from the State of Illinois to reduce the costs and help manage the risks associated with the redeployment.

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. 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 & 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.

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.

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.  

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.

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.

TradePoint Atlantic (TPA) – previously Sparrows Point Terminal – is a former 3,200 acre Bethlehem Steel plant site located in southeastern Baltimore County, Maryland.  TPA purchased the brownfield site in the fall of 2014 with plans to redevelop it into a major East Coast multi-modal distribution and manufacturing hub.

BLS & Co. was engaged to develop a comprehensive strategy to secure the public financing sources needed to mitigate the significant cost of repositioning a brownfields site of this scale and complexity.  Our services included:

• Benchmark analysis of the location’s incentives competitiveness versus similar competitive locations in seven other states;
• Management of a multi-firm team responsible for identifying and prioritizing available federal, state and local grant, incentives and financing programs to allow the developer to pursue environmental remediation and infrastructure improvements beyond what would otherwise be possible given market-based ROI targets;
• Development and execution of an overall strategy to design new incentives tools to improve the competitiveness of the site for potential tenants; and
• Development of a strategy for pursuit of public site development/remediation financing.

The competitive benchmarking analysis revealed an opportunity to improve the cost competitiveness of the site via the introduction of a targeted sales and use tax exemption for specified construction materials and warehousing equipment.  BLS & Co. served as “subject matter expert” to assist TPA in pursuit of the required legislation by documenting the competitive market-based rationale for the proposed exemption, providing data on similar programs in other locations, drafting proposed legislation and providing expert testimony during Senate and House hearings on the proposed legislation.  On May 19, 2016, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan signed the enabling legislation.