Better Packages, a Shelton-based manufacturer that has called Canal Street home for nearly 90 years, is moving to Ansonia.
The company will lease about 30,000 square feet in a building at the Hershey Industrial Park off North Division Street, Better Packages President Phil White said Monday.
Mayor David Cassetti announced the news at an Aldermen’s meeting Tuesday night, saying he and other city officials will continue a “full court press” to bring new businesses to the city.
The prime reason for the move?
“Our business is expanding,” White said.
The company makes water-activated tape dispensers, and sells more than 25,000 per year to customers in more than 70 countries, according to its website.
Clients include BMW, Crate & Barrel, and L.L. Bean, to name a few.
Click here to learn more.
The company’s current building — at 255 Canal St. in Shelton — is about 25,000 square feet.
A year ago the building was partially damaged by a fire that started in a vacant factory next door, but the company was back open the next day.
The $20 million company has called the building home since 1926, when it moved there from Brooklyn, NY.
At the time Canal Street was a bustling industrial sector.
It isn’t any more, but two, large, multi-family residential complexes have opened in recent years, and more are in the pipeline.
“It’s a residential street that has some old-time manufacturers on it,” White joked Monday. “The city needs to get people like us out of the way so they can finish doing their work efficiently.”
The city is also rebuilding Canal Street itself, which hasn’t been easy.
“We’ve lived with the street being an absolute mess for two years,” White said. “It’s the cost of progress, I understand it. But still, it’s not business-friendly from that vantage point.”
Still, he said the decision to move was a difficult one.
“Shelton’s a very, very business-friendly city,” White, who also serves as the chairman of the Greater Valley Chamber of Commerce’s board of directors, said. “Making this decision was not easy. It’s bittersweet because Shelton’s been home for 88 years. We’re not running from Shelton by any stretch, it’s a wonderful place to do business.”
White said the company looked at spaces up and down the Route 8 corridor — where most of its 31 full-time employees live — for a new location.
He said he also frequently fields offers from farther afield.
“We probably have three, four offers a year to go out of state, and they’re serious offers,” White said. “Would they probably be better alternatives if I looked at it just financially? The answer is yes.”
“But I’m from Connecticut, and a Valley guy,” he went on. “It isn’t just financial. It can’t be. If it is it’s a bad basis for your decision.”
To be sure, though, White said the move makes sense for the company financially. His business will be the first to participate in a Tax Incentive Program created last June by Aldermen.
The details have yet to be approved by Aldermen, but Economic Development Director Peter Kelly said that under the terms of an understanding reached between the city and White, Better Packages will receive a 50 percent tax break for three years on whatever improvements they make to their new building, and a 100 percent abatement for two years on whatever personal property — machinery, equipment, etc. — it brings to the Ansonia facility.
The precise numbers won’t be known until the business actually declares all of the specific building improvements and personal property, he said.
He said the cost of the tax breaks to the city will be defrayed partially because Ansonia is part of an “Enterprise Zone” created by which the state reimburses the city for a portion of the cost of local tax abatements.
The company’s new location — 4 Hershey Drive — is owned by a Bethany-based limited liability corporation. The building totals about 66,000 square feet, according to city land records.
Better Packages will put in about $200,000 in improvements, White said — on things like an employee cafeteria, office renovations, new computers and telephones.
He said the company will begin renovating the office space at its new location in early March, will start rehabbing the factory space in early April, and will make the move official later that month if all goes well.
White said the company will still occupy the Shelton building for much of this year as they prepare their new location for the move and wrap up projects they’ve already begun there.
Afterward, the company will sell the Shelton property, he said.
White thanked Cassetti and Economic Development Director Peter Kelly for their help with the move Monday.
“I give them a lot of kudos,” White said.
Cassetti said Tuesday that White first contacted him regarding a possible move early last month.
“We negotiated with him and went back and forth,” Cassetti said. “I really wanted him here. I told him we’re open for business and we’ll do whatever he needed to do.”
Kelly said Thursday that it’s encouraging when any new business comes to town, but emphasized economic development is a long-term effort.
“The key if I’m doing my job properly is to create an environment that naturally attracts the Better Packages, that naturally attracts other businesses and residents,” he said. “But it takes awhile to build that.”
