THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, March 19, 1995 TAG: 9503170194
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Annual Business Review
Cover Story
SOURCE: BY PATRICIA HUANG, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 120 lines
EMERGING FROM A brief lull in industrial business growth, Chesapeake industries continued to prosper last year, spending nearly $50 million in capital investments for new and expanded plants.
Seventeen new industrial companies opened or announced plans to open in 1994, bringing 455 new jobs and about $17 million in capital investments to Chesapeake. Twenty-eight more Chesapeake companies expanded their operations during the past year, creating 512 additional jobs and $31 million in capital investments.
``Last year was a year we were coming out of a slow period, and we were very pleased,'' said Donald Z. Goldberg, economic development director. ``We must be doing something right if our companies here want to grow here. I'm pretty pumped about the expansions.''
Some of the new companies that joined the city last year include Apex Office Systems, a company that distributes office hardware supplies; Total Distribution Services, a distribution and transportation for trucks; and Service America, a food vending service in Cavalier Industrial Park and one of the larger new employers with plans to hire 62 people.
Total Distribution Services, an affiliate of CSX Transportation in Deep Creek, plans to hire 50 employees and has made an initial capital investment of about $7 million. The company ships out new trucks made at the Ford plant in Norfolk.
Johnson Controls in the Cavalier Industrial Park broke ground last year, making an initial capital investment of about $7 million. The plant, which will manufacture automobile seats for Ford F150 and F250 trucks, is expected to open in November with a work force of about 130 employees.
Operation Blessing, an international humanitarian relief organization, also came to Chesapeake last year. It occupies 35,000 square feet of Greenbrier Industrial Park and made an initial capital investment of $350,000.
The Chesapeake location serves as the organization's East Coast distribution center for its Hunger Strike Force, an outreach program for disaster victims and disadvantaged people.
The program's 17 trucks collect donated and reduced-cost food from farms, water, appliances and medical supplies to distribute. Hunger Strike Force began in 1992 when Operation Blessing's first three trucks began collecting unsalable farm produce.
In its first three years of operations, Hunger Strike Force hauled more than 26 million pounds of food and about $12 million of materials to needy people in 14 states and the District of Columbia.
Operation Blessing's main headquarters is located on the campus of the Christian Broadcasting Network in Virginia Beach. Its East Coast distribution center and 17 trucks are housed in the new Chesapeake location. Its West Coast distribution center is in Riverside, Calif.
``Because the food is donated, we can actually deliver food for 5.7 cents a pound,'' said Jodie Nelson, spokeswoman for Operation Blessing. ``Last fall we had a farmer in Idaho donate four million pounds of potatoes. All those potatoes would've just been wasted if we hadn't gotten them.''
Nelson said that the organization chose the Chesapeake site for three main reasons: its proximity to the Virginia Beach headquarters, easy access to the interstate highway system and low rent for space.
The organization employs 30 people in Chesapeake. It hopes to add 20 more trucks to its fleet this year and eventually open a similar distribution center in the Midwest.
THE BIGGEST INDUSTRY BOOSTS last year came from the expansions of 28 Chesapeake companies.
Mitsubishi Chemicals, manufacturers of organic photoconductors, spent $13.7 million in capital investments for their expansion at Greenbrier Commerce Park, which added 25,500 additional square feet and created 38 new jobs.
Hiring 115 new employees, Westinghouse Electric Corp. was the largest employer of companies that expanded here last year. The anti-submarine warfare support center employs about 200 people, mostly contractors who install and maintain the systems on Navy ships.
``The reason we expanded is because Westinghouse assumed a bigger role (in Navy defense contracting),'' said Lee Kohlhafer, quality manager at the plant. ``As the program grew, we grew.''
Westinghouse looked at five Hampton Roads locations before choosing Chesapeake's Greenbrier Industrial Park in 1993, Kohlhafer said. The site is used primarily as a warehouse and office since most of their work is done on ships.
The company's site was chosen for its proximity to Interstate 64, excellent fire protection services, and its central location between Westinghouse's two local customers, Norfolk Naval Base and the Navy Underwater Warfare Center in Suffolk.
The defense electronics group had 1992 revenues of $2.7 billion, a major contributor to Pittsburgh-based Westinghouse Electric's 1992 total worldwide sales of $8.447 billion.
Chesapeake will likely see another boom in business growth this year, Goldberg said. Some hotels and large grocery store chains are currently looking into the area and two large shopping centers near Greenbrier Parkway are slated to open soon.
Good schools, a safe community and decent roads are some of the main things that attracts businesses to the area, Goldberg said.
``I travel all over the country, and I know people here complain about the roads being a little bit taxed, but I think we can get around most of the time,'' he said. ``As a matter of fact, most of them laugh and they say, `This is supposed to be a traffic jam?' They think we're a little bit spoiled.''
The beauty of the city's industrial economy is its diversity, Goldberg said. Unlike other Hampton Roads cities, Chesapeake is not as greatly affected by military cutbacks.
``We're always looking at assembly operations and distribution operations. and that's good. Diversity is good. We're not going to be affected if one sector of the economy goes down.'' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by STEVE EARLEY
The bulldozers are rolling in and staying busy as the city's economy
continues to expand.
Chart
Industrial Expansions
Source: Chesapeake Planning Department, U.S. Census
For copy of chart, see microfilm
by CNB