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February 6, 2006
Space wrangler | Oakland's FirstPark business park has plenty of available lots, and it's Andrew Nelson's job to spread the word
By Taylor Smith
Around the first of the year, everything seemed to come together for Andrew Nelson, a commercial broker for CB Richard Ellis/The Boulos Co. in Portland. Nelson has been in charge of marketing Oakland's FirstPark business park for about 18 months, but he says he's been in a holding pattern of late, waiting for a number of projects at the park to be completed before he could embark on a serious marketing push. But with the recent completion of a 20,000-square-foot spec building, continued hiring activity at T-Mobile's call-center facility and a handful of other developments at FirstPark, Nelson says he's gearing up to spread the word about the park.
The 285-acre, 24-lot park that skirts Interstate 95 just north of Waterville sat relatively empty for a few years, with its only large tenant being PFBF Certified Public Accountants, until Bellevue, Wash.-based T-Mobile USA in 2004 agreed to build an 80,000-square-foot call center there. Since then, the park has added a handful of new tenants, including Common Good Ventures. But Nelson hopes the arrival of T-Mobile and the new spec building will draw a host of additional tenants.
To encourage companies to take a closer look at FirstPark, Nelson is banking on new marketing materials, including a four-minute promotional video complete with scenic Maine vistas, high-tech images and laudatory testimonials from T-Mobile executives, which he says will be mailed out to as many as 10,000 companies. He also launched an online interactive site map. But Nelson says that marketing a business park in central Maine is not without unique challenges. Mainebiz recently sat down with Nelson to discuss some of those challenges ˆ including an ownership structure that includes two dozen communities, a labor force that may commute 50 miles or more and a small marketing budget ˆ along with his strategy to deal with them. The following is an edited transcript.
Mainebiz: How have all the recent changes at FirstPark affected the way you market the park?
Andrew Nelson: It's been a challenge because we've been in this holding pattern, waiting for a few of these major pieces to be done. Now, we're recreating all of our marketing materials because a lot's happened up there. It's better to market what's going on; it's not like this is going to be a great place ˆ this has already created a thousand jobs and it's already been a great success.
It's a different marketing approach than trying to tell someone that we're new and that we don't have anything here yet. So we've had to change all our materials; T-Mobile was building, we were building our spec building ˆ a number of buildings were under construction up there that we wanted to be completed so that we could include those in our marketing materials. So we really had a kind of waiting period, and now we're going full-tilt getting everything done.
Do you have to have a spec building to lure companies to a property like FirstPark?
It's been a mix. My client is the Kennebec Regional Development Authority ˆ they're the authority of the 24 communities that own FirstPark. They just developed their first spec building, a 20,000-square-foot building. It's being marketed for lease right now on the theory that you need to have that product available so somebody could come in and see it, and you've helped shorten their time from decision to occupancy.
A couple of local developers have done some small spec buildings where they went out and identified a tenant to go in there. But then there's T-Mobile and the accounting firm Perry, Fitts, Boulette & Fitton, and they built their own buildings. They came in and developed them and we didn't spec anything, so it's been a real mix.
How heavily are you leaning on T-Mobile in your marketing plan?
The T-Mobile deal really shows all the good things about the labor force and the park. It's one of those things where it's better to show than to tell. It changes the whole tone of our marketing pieces, but I don't know if any company really wants to be singled out. We don't want to hijack what they're doing, and we're very cognizant of that. But T-Mobile is definitely the big national, recognizable company that you can hang your hat on.
FirstPark has been around for a few years, and it seems to have taken a long time to attract tenants. Why do you think that is?
It's got to be the economy. Construction finished right after 9/11, and that was a severe challenge [FirstPark] faced in the beginning. The thing is, KRDA has managed their expectations. It's a long-term project and they know it, and they regularly remind themselves that even though they'd love a huge employer and a big deal to roll into FirstPark once a year, that's a challenge anywhere, let alone in central Maine.
How does working with a property like FirstPark compare to marketing a typical real estate project?
Twenty-four towns own First Park. It's a regional project, so that creates challenges right off the bat. Most of the communities up there are all members and owners of FirstPark, so our target audience is southern Maine and out of state. You're selling central Maine and its best attributes, and we focus on New England, the northeast and nationally. That's the real difference here: The audience is more national because we're not trying to pirate businesses locally and bring them to FirstPark. Our goal is to bring new businesses to the area. It's really an economic development project.
What kind of budget do you have to work with?
We have a modest marketing budget to do that on. I think this year we have a budget of $60,000.
That seems pretty small for a property that size.
One of the things that we do is try to get creative. We want to have a really first-rate website, and have the material that we can go out with and figure out the best way to [market] FirstPark within the budget. [That means] going to the right people, regularly sending signals out there that we're here. And how to do that on a modest budget is a challenge.
So what's your strategy been?
The website [launched January 1] is becoming a cornerstone of our information hub so that [local] communities can get information there. But I also want it to be a great marketing piece. We do some direct mail through [Portland-based] GG Direct and a few other companies, really letting [companies] know about the park and what's going on.
What kinds of companies are you targeting?
It's large companies that have back-office operations or data centers. We definitely have some target audiences like biotech companies and financial institutions. We'll do a mailing list based on one of those sectors. We'll tailor-make a package and get it out to them, whether it's five or 10 thousand pieces. And the website address will be all over it, so they can go there and not feel like they have to call to get more information, which I feel they're less likely to do. We're just trying to get them to check it out.
What are some of the challenges of marketing a business park in central Maine?
I think companies have a hard time believing people in Maine drive as far as they do for their jobs. But when you look at the labor force, the reality is that it would be nothing for someone to commute down from Bangor to Oakland for work, just like they commute from Portland to Augusta. If you live outside of Boston, you may live five or 10 miles outside of Boston, but it still might take you an hour to get to work. The reality here is that you can live 50 miles away and it still takes you an hour. And that, I think, is a hurdle mentally when people are thinking, "Okay, we might be drawing labor from 50 miles away." The demographics are definitely a different area; you're not just thinking Waterville and Oakland and Augusta. You have to branch out and think that you're going to draw from a much larger area than that.
Are there any concerns about the immediate area's workforce, though ˆ that it might not be big enough?
The feeling's always been that central Maine has a huge underemployed population, which is a difficult thing to identify and market. The T-Mobile jobs are really good jobs. Hundreds of people have been hired [at T-Mobile] already and they weren't unemployed. They were all shifting up in employment. It's not the unemployed that are being hired, it's people shifting their jobs for better pay and benefits and a higher skill set.
As that plays out [at T-Mobile], it will be a terrific case study for us because that will be a huge hiring ˆ more than 700 jobs. That'll be a good way for us to be able to say, "look, that was no problem for them."
The 285-acre, 24-lot park that skirts Interstate 95 just north of Waterville sat relatively empty for a few years, with its only large tenant being PFBF Certified Public Accountants, until Bellevue, Wash.-based T-Mobile USA in 2004 agreed to build an 80,000-square-foot call center there. Since then, the park has added a handful of new tenants, including Common Good Ventures. But Nelson hopes the arrival of T-Mobile and the new spec building will draw a host of additional tenants.
To encourage companies to take a closer look at FirstPark, Nelson is banking on new marketing materials, including a four-minute promotional video complete with scenic Maine vistas, high-tech images and laudatory testimonials from T-Mobile executives, which he says will be mailed out to as many as 10,000 companies. He also launched an online interactive site map. But Nelson says that marketing a business park in central Maine is not without unique challenges. Mainebiz recently sat down with Nelson to discuss some of those challenges ˆ including an ownership structure that includes two dozen communities, a labor force that may commute 50 miles or more and a small marketing budget ˆ along with his strategy to deal with them. The following is an edited transcript.
Mainebiz: How have all the recent changes at FirstPark affected the way you market the park?
Andrew Nelson: It's been a challenge because we've been in this holding pattern, waiting for a few of these major pieces to be done. Now, we're recreating all of our marketing materials because a lot's happened up there. It's better to market what's going on; it's not like this is going to be a great place ˆ this has already created a thousand jobs and it's already been a great success.
It's a different marketing approach than trying to tell someone that we're new and that we don't have anything here yet. So we've had to change all our materials; T-Mobile was building, we were building our spec building ˆ a number of buildings were under construction up there that we wanted to be completed so that we could include those in our marketing materials. So we really had a kind of waiting period, and now we're going full-tilt getting everything done.
Do you have to have a spec building to lure companies to a property like FirstPark?
It's been a mix. My client is the Kennebec Regional Development Authority ˆ they're the authority of the 24 communities that own FirstPark. They just developed their first spec building, a 20,000-square-foot building. It's being marketed for lease right now on the theory that you need to have that product available so somebody could come in and see it, and you've helped shorten their time from decision to occupancy.
A couple of local developers have done some small spec buildings where they went out and identified a tenant to go in there. But then there's T-Mobile and the accounting firm Perry, Fitts, Boulette & Fitton, and they built their own buildings. They came in and developed them and we didn't spec anything, so it's been a real mix.
How heavily are you leaning on T-Mobile in your marketing plan?
The T-Mobile deal really shows all the good things about the labor force and the park. It's one of those things where it's better to show than to tell. It changes the whole tone of our marketing pieces, but I don't know if any company really wants to be singled out. We don't want to hijack what they're doing, and we're very cognizant of that. But T-Mobile is definitely the big national, recognizable company that you can hang your hat on.
FirstPark has been around for a few years, and it seems to have taken a long time to attract tenants. Why do you think that is?
It's got to be the economy. Construction finished right after 9/11, and that was a severe challenge [FirstPark] faced in the beginning. The thing is, KRDA has managed their expectations. It's a long-term project and they know it, and they regularly remind themselves that even though they'd love a huge employer and a big deal to roll into FirstPark once a year, that's a challenge anywhere, let alone in central Maine.
How does working with a property like FirstPark compare to marketing a typical real estate project?
Twenty-four towns own First Park. It's a regional project, so that creates challenges right off the bat. Most of the communities up there are all members and owners of FirstPark, so our target audience is southern Maine and out of state. You're selling central Maine and its best attributes, and we focus on New England, the northeast and nationally. That's the real difference here: The audience is more national because we're not trying to pirate businesses locally and bring them to FirstPark. Our goal is to bring new businesses to the area. It's really an economic development project.
What kind of budget do you have to work with?
We have a modest marketing budget to do that on. I think this year we have a budget of $60,000.
That seems pretty small for a property that size.
One of the things that we do is try to get creative. We want to have a really first-rate website, and have the material that we can go out with and figure out the best way to [market] FirstPark within the budget. [That means] going to the right people, regularly sending signals out there that we're here. And how to do that on a modest budget is a challenge.
So what's your strategy been?
The website [launched January 1] is becoming a cornerstone of our information hub so that [local] communities can get information there. But I also want it to be a great marketing piece. We do some direct mail through [Portland-based] GG Direct and a few other companies, really letting [companies] know about the park and what's going on.
What kinds of companies are you targeting?
It's large companies that have back-office operations or data centers. We definitely have some target audiences like biotech companies and financial institutions. We'll do a mailing list based on one of those sectors. We'll tailor-make a package and get it out to them, whether it's five or 10 thousand pieces. And the website address will be all over it, so they can go there and not feel like they have to call to get more information, which I feel they're less likely to do. We're just trying to get them to check it out.
What are some of the challenges of marketing a business park in central Maine?
I think companies have a hard time believing people in Maine drive as far as they do for their jobs. But when you look at the labor force, the reality is that it would be nothing for someone to commute down from Bangor to Oakland for work, just like they commute from Portland to Augusta. If you live outside of Boston, you may live five or 10 miles outside of Boston, but it still might take you an hour to get to work. The reality here is that you can live 50 miles away and it still takes you an hour. And that, I think, is a hurdle mentally when people are thinking, "Okay, we might be drawing labor from 50 miles away." The demographics are definitely a different area; you're not just thinking Waterville and Oakland and Augusta. You have to branch out and think that you're going to draw from a much larger area than that.
Are there any concerns about the immediate area's workforce, though ˆ that it might not be big enough?
The feeling's always been that central Maine has a huge underemployed population, which is a difficult thing to identify and market. The T-Mobile jobs are really good jobs. Hundreds of people have been hired [at T-Mobile] already and they weren't unemployed. They were all shifting up in employment. It's not the unemployed that are being hired, it's people shifting their jobs for better pay and benefits and a higher skill set.
As that plays out [at T-Mobile], it will be a terrific case study for us because that will be a huge hiring ˆ more than 700 jobs. That'll be a good way for us to be able to say, "look, that was no problem for them."
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