Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, January 22, 1995 TAG: 9501200041
SECTION: ECONOMY PAGE: 5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RICHARD FOSTER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
About a decade ago, Tom Robinson was the kind of guy who would show up at a factory with a toothbrush in his pocket - so he could tell the owners he wasn't leaving without a contract.
These days, Robinson - the owner of United Metal Finishing Co. in Bedford - is a little more laid back and a lot happier.
``It doesn't count when you die,'' he said recently, then paused to light his pipe. ``I don't want to turn around and find out that my 8-year-old is graduating from high school.''
Last summer, Robinson moved his business, which primarily serves clients in New England, from Springfield, Mass., to Bedford.
Like many Northern business owners, he migrated south looking for lower taxes and overhead. But he also discovered that advances in telecommunications and shipping have made it easy for him to live and work where he wants to, instead of where his customer base is located.
``Most of the business I had in New England is staying with us. It's not that difficult with shipping the way it is these days, thank goodness.'' he said. ``It's pretty much the same client base. The only change is that my fax rings a lot more.''
United Metal Finishing specializes in polishing and finishing metal - everything from small parts for manufacturing firms to hardware items such as door knobs. The company even polished a 16-foot-tall bronze sculpture once.
Back in Massachusetts, Robinson had 14 full-time employees who worked in a 7,500 square-foot building. None of those employees relocated with him.
Now he employs just two people - another polisher and a secretary - and his new headquarters is a 4,500 square-foot white cinder-block building that was formerly an auto garage. It sits in Bedford, nestled in a grassy lot near some train tracks.
The property gives him room to expand, and he hopes to employ 10 more people as his business picks up in the next few years.
Instead of living in a crowded New England suburb with little land, burgeoning crime and high real estate taxes, Robinson, his wife and two daughters live in Moneta on a 25-acre farm with a horse pasture.
His oldest daughter, Alysia, 15, rides horses and works at a nearby stable. Robinson is able to take his youngest daughter, Meghan, 8, on long nature hikes in the woods around their property.
``It's a slower pace of life. The lifestyle is just so much more enjoyable,'' he said. ``It's not nearly as hectic as it was in the Northeast.''
Robinson first discovered the Roanoke Valley on a camping trip at Smith Mountain Lake in the late 1980s. After the 1990 recession, he began to think of relocating from Massachusetts, or ``Taxachusetts,'' as he calls it.
Playing a major part in that decision was Region 2000, Lynchburg's regional economic development agency.
``I met with Region 2000 and toured some plants and sites with them. I wasn't quite ready to make the move, but they firmed up my belief that I could make it here.
``Hopefully, it was a calculated risk. My wife and I are in our early 40s, and we didn't want to get to our 60s and say we should have done it.''
Another transplant from the North is Roy McCormack, who moved his family business from Connecticut to Roanoke two years ago. His journey was similar to Robinson's.
McCormack's Intricate Metal Forming Co. makes small connector pins and circuit-board parts used in automobile computers, telecommunications products and home electronics such as compact disc players.
Most of his business came from the automotive industry in the Midwest, hard hit by the 1990 recession. The cost of doing business in New England was prohibitive, he said, and for his son and vice president, Scot, the cost of living was too high to raise a family.
``We felt Connecticut was not the place to live. We looked in West Virginia, Virginia, Pennsylvania and North Carolina,'' McCormack said. ``Oddly enough, Roanoke seemed to take the most interest in us.
``We're a five-employee company. Most people put us aside and said, `Who needs you?' Region 2000 and [the Roanoke Valley Economic Development Partnership] took an active interest in us. We had the flexibility to be anywhere, but the main reason we're not in North Carolina or Pennsylvania or West Virginia is the Partnership and their attitude toward us.
``They told me, `We'd rather have 50 companies with five employees than one company with 500 employees.'''
Two years after the move, McCormack has diversified so that automotive clients only make up about half of his business. His new building is twice as big as the one left behind in Connecticut, and McCormack is getting ready to hire a seventh employee.
He didn't lose any customers in the move, and his client base has actually increased by 25 percent, though it doesn't include any local companies.
``We're definitely more competitive here,'' he said. ``The costs are lower - electricity, insurance, labor rates, lease space rates. We're only paying more for freight, and that's because our materials come from New York and Connecticut.''
Beth Doughty, executive director of the Roanoke Valley Economic Development Partnership, said Robinson's and McCormack's stories are typical of relocating Northern business owners.
``Lower operating costs have helped businesses grow and have made the Southeast an attractive location for relocation and expansion,'' she said. ''And on top of it, it's a nice place to live.
``With a lot of companies out of the Northeast, they had a lot of business in the Northeast and upper Atlantic, but they find out over time that a lot of their business moves south.''
More and more, businesses such as United Metal Finishing and Intricate Metal Forming, which are not tied to a central location, are moving where the owners find the quality of life better, she said.
``We have a global economy now,'' she said. ``Delivery systems are better than they've ever been. Telecommunications makes communication the same whether you're next door or around the world, and that has brought every market closer.''
The Roanoke Valley is ideally suited to relocating Northern businesses, Doughty said, because of its central location on the East Coast and its easy access to highway and rail delivery services.
And that's what Robinson is banking on. He has already picked up some business from metal shops in Roanoke and Lynchburg, and he's hoping his location between the two cities and in the center of the East Coast will bring more contracts his way.
As he held a piece of metal waiting to be polished, Robinson looked out at the clear blue sky and said, ``I've been called everything from a guy with a lot of guts to a real idiot, because you just don't pick up your family and your business and move away from your customers.
``My only regret, honestly, is that I didn't move here sooner.''
UNITED METAL FINISHING CO.
THE COMPANY: United Metal Finishing Co., which primarily serves clients in New England and the Northeast, moved to it's new headquarters in a 4,500 square-foot building in Bedford, Va., from Springfield, Mass., last summer.
HEADQUARTERS: Bedford.
OPERATIONS: The company specializes in polishing and finishing metal products.
ANNUAL SALES: Declined to give estimates.
EMPLOYEES: Two.
INTRICATE METAL FORMING CO.
THE COMPANY: Intricate Metal Forming Co. moved to Virginia from Connecticut two years ago. Since the move, the firm's client base has increased by 25 percent, though it doesn't include any local companies.
HEADQUARTERS: Roanoke.
OPERATIONS: The company makes small connector pins and circuit-board parts used in automobile computers, telecommunications products and home electronics.
ANNUAL SALES: $1 million.
EMPLOYEES: Six.
by CNB