Industrial park managers create new communities

By KARLEEN KOZACZKA
Essex County Newspapers

Industrial parks are not usually thought of as welcoming places. Large, square buildings stretch across acres of the no-man’s land known as the “commercial district.”

But the owners and occupants of several industrial parks on the North Shore are trying to change that image. They are working to bring the companies in the parks together and searching for ways to make the parks more appealing for employees.

Newsletters are distributed at a couple of parks to keep businesses updated on tenant changes and to offer the services of each business.

At the Cummings Center in Beverly, for instance, a monthly newsletter makes its way to every business.

"It's one of a number of vehicles we use to develop their sense of community," said General Manager Gerald McSweeney. "The newsletter gets them networking with each other.

"We definitely try to create that atmosphere because it's an important element of marketing an office campus like ours," he added.

At the Lord Timothy Dexter Industrial Green in Newburyport, the Newburyport Area Industrial Development (NAID) Corp., which initially set up the park in 1963, has also recently launched a newsletter.

"The object of the newsletter is to develop the pride of the people in the park and make them aware of their neighbors," said Curt Gerrish, vice president of NAID and president of Rochester Electronics in the park.

The newsletter reports on happenings in the industrial park, from new construction to landscaping.

The Shetland Park on the Salem waterfront does not have a newsletter, but it does print a service directory that is distributed about every four months. The directory introduces new companies and offers services to other companies in the park.

"The directory states what the company does and how it can benefit other companies in the park," said Linda Johnston, marketing administrator for Shetland Properties, manager of the park.

"The companies will also offer discounts to Shetland tenants" through the directory, Johnston said.

Personal contact between businesses is also a technique used in a couple of parks to foster a sense of community.

Louis Rubenfeld, president of Stairensier, a company in the Lord Timothy Dexter Green park, has recently been appointed chairman of the Newburyport Chamber of Commerce Industrial Committee.

He explained that companies in the park hold both formal Industrial Committee meetings and informal company meetings to discuss the park.

"We have some informal breakfast meetings once a month. We gather as many industry leaders and speakers to discuss the issues that are very important to the growth of industry in Newburyport," he said.

"The Industrial Committee works with the Chamber of Commerce to become more involved in the community," he continued. "Before this, the industrial park was sort of the stepchild of Newburyport business."

The most important thing is informal networking among businesses, agreed the Cummings Center's McSweeney.

"We have several law offices here. One attorney told me a story that he was carrying his trash out to the compactor and he just started chatting with someone, and he ended up with a new client," McSweeney said. "We definitely encourage that.

"If a new business moves in and they need phone services, we say, `Well, gee, we have a company that does that here,' or they need Internet service. Well, we have that here too," he added. "The networking is very important."

Several industrial parks focus on giving employees opportunities to enjoy themselves during a work day.

The Blackburn Center in Gloucester, next to the city-owned Blackburn Industrial Park, offers a health club, yoga and massage center and a restaurant.

"People in great numbers go out at noontime. It's so easy to walk around because there's no traffic," said John McNiff, of the McNiff Co., owner of the park.

"When you're building the park, subliminally you always like to have a good, attractive complexion. You try extra hard to get things that will make it more pleasant as a business complex, and pleasant for the 3,000 people who work here," McNiff said.

The managers of Salem's Shetland Park brought in a restaurant that is easily accessible to all businesses through a skywalk.

"We definitely marketed a restaurant in the park for tenants. They deliver to offices, it's a meeting place. It's been very successful," Johnston said.

The Cherry Hill Industrial Park in Beverly and Danvers boasts a cafeteria, tennis courts, immaculate landscaping and golf tournaments.

There's regular communication from the company that manages the park as well, said Robert Bradford, president of the North Shore Chamber of Commerce, which is located in the park.

"It's important for industrial parks to offer these things now. Most do," he added.

The Cummings Center, which was formerly a factory widely known as The Shoe, contains a restaurant, gym and day-care services, McSweeney said.

The center also hosts functions, such as an upcoming job fair, to attract potential employees strictly for the center.

"One of the issues parks face is recruiting new people," McSweeney. "We can bring prospective people on site and show them some amenities."

And finally, a feeling of community can easily be lost in a building with four miles of corridors, so the Cummings Center invites tenants to create posters to display in the halls for some exposure, McSweeney said.

"It's hard when your building is a quarter of a mile long. But we do what we can to create an atmosphere of community," he said.