A new event center is opening its doors in New Albany.

The Estate at New Albany, a 15,000-square-foot event venue, opened its doors for business this month at 5216 Forest Dr. The venue is the third for the Brooks family, which owns the Brookshire venue is near Lewis Center and WatersEdge Event & Conference Center in Hilliard.

“We’re already seeing a lot of interest in reserving the space,” owner John Brooks told me.

The venue features open meeting areas with a large central event room and several side areas, including two suites for a bride and groom, outdoor patios and technology for business gatherings and working events. The interior was designed by Lisa Coleman of 6 Design.

The largest room, which is 4,500 square foot, can accommodate as many as 375 guests. The 1,900 square feet of meeting rooms can seat as many as 210.

Brooks said he expects a 50-50 mix of corporate and family events. Between weddings, bar mitzvahs and other events, the two standing venues are booked well into 2019 with an increasing number of events being held during the week.

Corporate events and weddings have increased thanks to in-house catering, event planning and other services that allow for all-in-one packages. All-day weddings – ceremony, dinner and reception – and multi-day retreats for companies are doable, Brooks said.

“This used to be a spring and summer business, but it seems like people are getting married all year long anymore,” he said.

Brooks’ wife, Joy, founded the wedding planning business that eventually expanded into wedding venues. The couple’s three children and grandchildren are active in the venue management, catering and event planning operations.

The project cost Brookshire Banquet LLC about $5 million to build out, including about $900,000 to buy the land earlier this year. Westerville’s Kleingers Group was the civil engineer, Feher Architecture LLC of Columbus was the architect and Equity Construction Solutions built the venue.

By Tristan Navera
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Nearly a year after being split from its former UK parent, a supplier of fragrances for home care products such as air fresheners has been acquired by a Canadian consumer goods manufacturer.

Aromair Fine Fragrance Company Inc. just expanded this fall in New Albany, leasing an 84,000-square-foot manufacturing space. It has 200 employees over a total 140,000 square feet along Smith’s Mill Road.

Knowlton Development Corp., a Montreal-based contract manufacturer of health and beauty products, acquired Aromair for an undisclosed sum. Messages seeking comment were left with both. Private equity firm Novacap has backed several acquisitions for KDC in the past three years.

Strategic Value Partners, a London private equity firm that specializes in distressed assets, had invested in former parent Jeyes Group in 2011, when Jeyes first expanded to New Albany’s business park.

It has since became a majority owner of Aromair. Last December it sold off Jeyes, which made household cleaners.

By Carrie Ghose
From Columbus Business First

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Amazon.com Inc. plans to add up to 12 more data centers to the three it started running a year ago in Central Ohio, adding jobs and investment – but it wants a discount on its electric bill first.

The e-commerce giant’s Vadata Inc. affiliate said in a regulatory filing it would build up to four more centers each on its sites in Dublin, Hilliard and New Albany.

“In just three years, the combined direct, indirect and induced effects of (Amazon’s) investment could create thousands of new jobs in Ohio and hundreds of millions of dollars in new regional income and GDP in Ohio,” says the joint filing from Amazon affiliate Vadata Inc. and American Electric Power Company Inc.

“There is even greater long-term potential for additional data center development beyond these three campuses as enterprises migrate more and more of their IT resources to the cloud,” it says.

Data centers usually run on spare staff, but the development would add at least 25 jobs, the minimum required when seeking an economic development arrangement from the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio.

Any job, wage, electric usage or other numbers specific to the project are blacked out from documents as trade secrets. Amazon has previously said it would invest $1.1 billion in a Central Ohio data center network. The company landed $24 million in state and local incentives for the data centers and distribution warehouses.

PUCO conducts a hearing Tuesday on the request for a tiered discount on electricity usage as the data center network expands, plus other fee reductions. Economic development officials from the three suburbs signed a letter supporting the deal.

Vadata’s application says only that the discount would be “modest.” From the character widths of blacked out figures, it appears that the discount on the kilowatt hour usage rate rises from single to double digits once the fifth data center is online.

The Office of the Ohio Consumers’ Counsel, the agency representing residential rate-payers, and the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association filed public comments arguing the secretive discount will inevitably lead to other customers making up for AEP’s lost revenue.

AEP (NYSE:AEP) would benefit from the expansion of a customer like Amazon (Nasdaq:AMZN), their joint filing says. It’s a large, steady user of power with consistent consumption 24 hours – no peaks and valleys at different times of days. In the aggregate, the application says, cloud computing in specialty facilities is more energy-efficient than numerous clients’ on-site servers.

AEP Ohio’s residential customers currently pay a 75 cent monthly surcharge to make up for other economic development deals, adding up to about $12 million yearly. Amazon emphasizes its discount would not be added to that line item.

The Consumers’ Counsel isn’t buying the feint: “Nonetheless, it can be expected that AEP will seek to collect from other customers, through charges on customers’ electric bills, the revenues AEP would forgo as a result of the discounts proposed in the application,” the agency filing says.

The unknown billing borne by other customers is “not limited or capped,” said the manufacturing trade group’s filing. “Moreover, the joint application is void of any specific commitments by Vadata regarding capital investment and employment levels that may provide public interest benefits.”

By Carrie Ghose
From Columbus Business First

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Pizzuti Cos. has landed two tenants for a New Albany industrial development.

The companies have signed leases for Pizzuti’s Multi-Tenant II building on New Albany’s Innovation Campus. The two will use 50 percent of the 264,000 square foot speculative building at 8820 Smith’s Mill Road.

With these projects, the Columbus development firm has 144,000 square feet of space remaining in the building to lease out.

Aromair Fine Fragrance, which is based in a nearby building in the park, is expanding and moving into 84,000 square feet of leased space in Multi-Tenant II. The company is a manufacturer and distributor of fragrances, home and air care products.

It has a workforce of more than 200 people, including chemists, engineers, marketing professionals and production workers.

The other tenant is a New York-based company, Onyx Packaging Corp. The company designs, manufactures and distributes packaging especially for the cosmetics and personal care industries. They will use 36,000 square feet in the building.

“We’re pleased to welcome both Aromair Fine Fragrance and Onyx Packaging to our new multi-tenant building,” said Joel Pizzuti, president of Pizzuti Cos. in a statement. “Interest from potential tenants remains strong, as they recognize that New Albany’s Innovation Campus is an ideal location in which to conduct business.”

Pizzuti was the developer on the warehouse, which began construction in July 2016, with Ford & Associates as the architect and Corna Kokosing as the contractor.

In total, it has built more than 3 million square feet of space at New Albany’s Innovation Campus. Jim Miller with Pizzuti manages the leases there.

Last month, Pizzuti also began work on a $34.5 million, 1.5 million-square-foot expansion of its CreekSide Industrial Center near Rickenbacker and also began work on the next 223,750-square-foot spec building at the Southpark Industrial Center.

Pizzuti’s activity comes at a time that industrial development in Columbus is red hot. Central Ohio has an industrial vacancy rate at 4.4 percent, and more than 3.2 million square feet of speculative development is now under construction, JLL found.

By Tristan Navera
From Columbus Business First

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A former New Albany golf course has been rezoned to improve its marketability as part of the New Albany International Business Park.

New Albany City Council in June approved the rezoning of 310 acres, 207 of which includes the former Winding Hollow Golf and Event Center, 6140 Babbitt Road. The facility closed in January 2015.

Tom Rubey, development director for the New Albany Co., which owns the Winding Hollow land, said the zoning change opens the site up for consideration from more users.

He said although he couldn’t provide a timeline for when the land would be developed, the New Albany Co. has been marketing the site.

“Our success in landing high-quality companies in New Albany has been due to us having shovel-ready sites that are appropriately zoned with power redundancy, infrastructure and the like,” Rubey said.

New businesses usually are good news for New Albany.

More than 80 percent of New Albany’s annual revenue is tied to income taxes, according to city spokesman Scott McAfee. That’s why city leaders place an emphasis on building a strong job base in the city, he said.

The zoning change from limited office-campus district to limited general employment could help attract large corporate headquarters and technology parks, according to community-development director Jennifer Chrysler’s legislative report to City Council.

The reason is the new zoning would allow more uses than the previous one did, the report said.

The site was annexed in 2015, most of it from Plain Township, Chrysler said. The land is south of state Route 161 along the Beech Road corridor.

Ideally, a tenant or tenants would want to build a campus on the site, Chrysler said. Although companies have not been identified, the rezoning is a proactive measure to prepare for future opportunities, she said.

“It’s just one more step in trying to get it ready for future prospects,” she said.

The business park already includes corporate and regional offices and companies that specialize in health care, information technology, technology, personal care and beauty, manufacturing and logistics, Chrysler said.

The Winding Hollow land could be used for any of those industries, although a research facility or corporate headquarters would best support the infrastructure that would need to be developed in the area, she said.

By Sarah Sole
From This Week News

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Wallick Communities will bring 90 jobs to New Albany when it moves its headquarters to the city.

The business will move into Market and Main II, a 48,000-square-foot office space being developed in a joint venture between Daimler Group and the New Albany Co., said project spokeswoman Lisa Hinson.

Wallick is a 50-year-old business focused on providing affordable housing and senior living, said CEO Tom Feusse. Business units include real-estate development, construction, property management and asset management.

The company has been headquartered off Tussing Road in Columbus, just south of Reynoldsburg but with a Reynoldsburg mailing address, for 34 years and will move to New Albany in mid-October, Feusse said.

The business has 800 total associations and adds about 150 jobs every year, Feusse said. Those jobs primarily are the management of Wallick’s 200 apartment, assisted-living and memory-care communities, he said.

New Albany’s “walkability” was the primary reason for the move, Feusse said. Employees will be able to access leisure paths, restaurants and the Philip Heit Center for Healthy New Albany, he said.

“We just felt like that was a healthier working environment for our associates,” he said.

The building’s construction also gives company officials the opportunity to create a new space for employees, he said.

“We’re really excited for that opportunity,” he said.

Wallick will move into an 18,000-square-foot space on the second floor of the building under construction at 160 W. Main St.

Hinson said shops, eateries and service providers on the first floor of the building will be announced in the coming months.

“New Albany’s village center has always been an important component of the master plan for the community, not only for residents but for the 14,000-plus people employed at the business park, ” said New Albany Co. President Bill Ebbing in a written statement. “We continue to focus on creating a walkable destination where residents and employees can easily access amenities like the library, the arts center, the school(-district) campus, Village Hall, the health center, shops, offices, restaurants and more.”

By Sarah Sole
From This Week Community News

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A business with North American headquarters in New Albany is planning a fourth expansion that will create 30 jobs.

Axium Plastics, 9005 Smith’s Mill Road, will build a $5.1 million building on Innovation Campus Way West to augment its facilities in New Albany. The business’ international headquarters is in Ontario, Canada.

To help facilitate the project, New Albany City Council on June 20 approved a 100 percent property-tax abatement valued about $90,000 per year.

The incentive would last for 10 years if Axium builds an advanced “green” building and seven years if it builds a baseline “green” building, said Jennifer Chrysler, New Albany’s community-development director. The “green” ratings are based on the building’s level of environmental sustainability with regard to its construction.

Axium Plastics, a contract manufacturer, built its first New Albany facility in 2011, according to the legislative report for City Council. The company expanded in 2012 and again in 2015 as part of a $40.4 million investment thus far in New Albany.

“There’s a large diversification of jobs for this company,” Chrysler said.

The 30 new jobs would create a minimum of $1 million in annual payroll for the company, she said.

Each year, revenue-sharing agreements for income taxes on the payroll would send a minimum of $6,000 to repay infrastructure debt in the New Albany International Business Park, $5,500 for the Johnstown-Monroe Local School District and $5,500 for New Albany’s general fund, Chrysler said.

New Albany has provided financial incentives for each of Axium’s expansions in New Albany, she said, and the company has exceeded the eligibility benchmarks for each of those incentives, both in the number of jobs as well as payroll thresholds.

Ven Bhindwallam, a controller for Axium, said the company nearly is ready to begin construction. The building is slated to be complete by the end of December. The company has about 450 employees in New Albany, he said.

The location has helped Axium expand because Columbus is a supply-chain hub, he said.

By Sarah Sole
From This Week News

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California-based Bocchi Laboratories’ expansion plans will add 75 full-time jobs to its facility on Smith’s Mill Road.

Kevin Lee, vice president of business development for Bocchi, said the 72,000-square-foot expansion would be a $5 million investment.

“Design is complete,” he said. “We are going for permitting at this time with the city of New Albany.”

Bocchi’s 126,000-square-foot facility is used for manufacturing private-label personal-care products, such as perfumes, body mists and body spray, Lee said. The expansion will enable the facility to begin manufacturing lotions, shampoos and hand and body creams, he said.

Lee said company officials want to begin construction for the expansion this spring and complete it by the beginning of September. The 75 jobs would be added over a two-year period.

New Albany City Council on April 4 approved a 100 percent real-property-tax abatement for a term of 10 or 15 years for Bocchi’s expansion.

Jennifer Chrysler, New Albany’s community-development director, said the incentive term would depend upon how environmentally friendly the expansion will be.

Chrysler said she was unable to determine the anticipated value of the incentive because the city doesn’t have the approved design plan. She said she was not comfortable estimating the building value until she knows the final size of the building.

According to council’s legislative report, as of Dec. 31, Bocchi reported 300 jobs and a payroll of $10.3 million at the New Albany facility.

The 75 full-time jobs created as a result of the expansion would have an additional annual payroll of $2 million, the report said.

The additional annual income-tax revenue from the new jobs would be $40,000. Per revenue-sharing agreements, $12,000 would go toward infrastructure debt, $6,000 would go to Columbus, $11,000 would go to the Johnstown-Monroe Local School District and $11,000 would go to New Albany’s general fund. Most of New Albany’s general-fund revenue comes from income-tax collections.

Bocchi opened its New Albany facility in 2015, Lee said. The New Albany International Business Park’s Personal Care and Beauty Campus and its manufacturer groups, as well as the available incentives, helped persuade the business to locate there, he said.

In 2014, City Council approved a 100 percent real-property-tax abatement for 15 years for the initial project.

By  Sarah Sole
From This Week Community News

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New Albany Community Foundation executive director Craig Mohre sees potential in a recent collaboration with the city.

Years from now, markers installed by the community foundation could be included in a walking tour telling the story of how cooperation and shared visions helped New Albany evolve, he said.

Residents might have noticed the new markers at three locations: the Philip Heit Center for Healthy New Albany, the New Albany branch of the Columbus Metropolitan Library and the Jeanne B. McCoy Community Center for the Arts.

Mohre said the goal is to recognize ways in which organizations and agencies have worked together to create opportunities throughout the community.

“I want to make sure that spirit of cooperation continues,” Mohre said.

Each location will receive a plaque and a marker including information about everyone involved with the project, he said.

Although the first three markers are installed at the Heit Center, the library and the McCoy Center, the plaques have yet to be installed, Mohre said.

All three facilities were collaborations, he said.

The library was a collaboration between the Columbus Metropolitan Library and the New Albany Community Foundation; the McCoy Center was a product of the New Albany-Plain Local School District, the city of New Albany, Plain Township and the New Albany Community Foundation; and the Heit Center was a joint effort among the city, Healthy New Albany, the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center and Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Mohre said.

The New Albany Co. also donated land for the McCoy Center and the Heit Center, he said.

The community foundation plans to add three city locations with markers this year, Mohre said.

The school district’s campus will be one, he said, because the New Albany Co. donated land and the New Albany Community Authority was used to help build the high school.

Similarly, the nature preserve and wetlands near the K-1 building were a collaboration between the school district and New Albany, with the goal that the land could serve as an environmental science lab for students, Mohre said.

“It was forward thinking of those community leaders to actually make that happen,” he said.

Finally, the foundation plans to install a marker at Wexner Community Park, 7600 Swickard Woods Blvd., land for which the New Albany Co. opted to donate to the community instead of using for residential use, Mohre said.

Other past and future collaborative projects that might be recognized include the Plain Township fire station at 9500 Johnstown Road, the planned amphitheater at the McCoy Center and the eventual beautification plans for the Rose Run corridor, he said.

New Albany spokesman Scott McAfee said the community foundation’s initiative is an opportunity for future residents to learn the origins of local attractions and facilities.

“They are an opportunity to apply recognition to some of the catalytic projects that have impacted our community in some way,” he said.

By Sarah Sole
From This Week News

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New Albany officials estimate a new $15 million project in the New Albany International Business Park will create as many as 200 jobs and generate $100,000 a year in annual income-tax collections.

More than 80 percent of the city’s annual revenue is tied to income taxes, according to New Albany spokesman Scott McAfee. That’s why city leaders place an emphasis on building a strong job base in the city, he said.

Columbus-based Carey Realty Investments plans to build a 300,000-square-foot industrial building on the southeast corner of Innovation Campus Way and Harrison Road.

The building, which will be used by logistics and manufacturing businesses, is being built speculatively, said company president and CEO Ed Carey.

CRI is working with M+A Architects on the project and is in the process of selecting a construction company, he said.

Construction is expected to begin this spring, and the building should be ready for occupancy by the end of the year, Carey said.

New Albany has awarded a property-tax abatement to CRI, and the duration of the abatement depends upon how environmentally friendly the new building will be, said Jennifer Chrysler, director of community development.

CRI will either receive a 10-year abatement on property taxes, a value of about $2.6 million, or a 15-year abatement, a value of $4 million, Chrysler said.

Of the $100,000 in annual income-tax revenue the project is projected to generate, about $30,000 would go toward infrastructure payments, $26,000 would go to Columbus, $22,000 would go to the Licking Heights Local School District and $22,000 would go to the city’s general fund, Chrysler said.

The project is a result of the city’s infrastructure investment in the expansion of Innovation Campus Way to the east, Chrysler said.

The road is being extended 5,000 feet east from Harrison to Mink Street and is slated to be finished this summer. Innovation Campus Way also was extended 1,500 feet west from Beech Road.

Chrysler said city officials have worked for several years to diversity the industries in the business park. The park began attracting corporate offices and operations centers, but the city’s fiber-optics network soon lured data centers, she said.

Likewise, the presence of Mount Carmel New Albany Surgical Hospital and OrthoNeuro brought businesses in the health-care industry.

As the business park’s Personal Care and Beauty Campus filled out, the city has shown that it also can be a home for manufacturing and logistics centers, Chrysler said.

Chrysler said CRI’s project is its first in New Albany.

“We’re excited to work with this team,” she said.

By Sarah Sole
From This Week News

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