Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, March 30, 1990 TAG: 9003300196
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GEORGE KEGLEY BUSINESS EDITOR
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Couvrette, president of Couvrette Building Systems, saw the former Gardner-Denver plant in Salem when he first looked at sites in the Roanoke area, but he looked at about a dozen other sites and buildings in Roanoke and Roanoke County before he made the final choice.
"Finding Roanoke was a real special thing for us," Couvrette said Thursday. Bill Ross of CorEast Savings Bank, a customer of the California company, brought Couvrette to the Roanoke Valley.
With Ralph Mabes, a real estate agent, Couvrette looked at Roanoke's shell building, a building site off King Street in Northeast Roanoke, other locations along Virginia 419 and a variety of places throughout the Roanoke Valley.
During the selection process, Couvrette brought a group of 15 managers and wives to Roanoke for a two-day tour of the valley, a presentation on Roanoke schools and a look at housing. Phil Sparks of Roanoke's Economic Development Department and Mark Heath, executive director of Roanoke Regional Partnership, flew to California to help Couvrette make up his mind.
As his industry expands, Couvrette said, "you don't want to jump the gun. You want to be there with the right timing. We were sold on the Roanoke area a long time ago but the timing wasn't right."
Couvrette gave Roanoke high marks for its school system, "superior" to California's, and he found "a good bunch of handball players at the YMCA."
The city of Salem "made it clear there would be no problems in setting up and getting permits. We don't hear that in California. We have so many bureaucracies."
Joe Yates, director of planning and development in Salem, said Couvrette wanted an existing building "and he got what he wanted."
Brian Wishneff, economic development chief for Roanoke, said Couvrette is the third company - after Tweeds and Arkay Packaging - locating outside Roanoke "after we showed them sites." Tweeds and Arkay, both brought to the Roanoke Valley by contacts in Roanoke, are building plants at the Roanoke-Botetourt Industrial Park near Bonsack.
During the Arkay search for a site for its cosmetics packaging business, Sparks arranged a meeting at the VIP lounge in Roanoke Regional Airport so company officials could confer with representatives of all valley governing bodies.
During the wooing of Arkay, Howard Kaneff, company chairman, came from his Long Island offices to trade Republican Party conversation with Roanoke Mayor Noel Taylor at a Hotel Roanoke breakfast.
Jennifer Freeman, a New York consultant who helped Arkay find its site, said the Roanoke economic development staff "gave us a real red-carpet treatment but we felt from the beginning that they were selling the area and not the city over the others."
by CNB