stefan
07-08-2007, 10:33 PM
Ogden bounces back, edges SLC in luring recreation
Lower cost of living tips scales for Amer Sport to choose Junction City
By Derek P. Jensen and Kristen Moulton
The Salt Lake Tribune
The 2002 Winter Olympics had Salt Lake City's name, but the Games' economic legacy may belong to Park City and, suddenly, Ogden.
Thirty-five miles north of Utah's capital, the once-moribund railroad hub just unfurled its much-ballyhooed outdoor-recreation center. The sparkling downtown facility - awash in surf streams, a sky-diving tunnel and a massive climbing wall in the shadow of the Wasatch Mountains - bears a brand name of Amer Sports Corp., the world's largest sports-equipment company, which decided last year to plop its North American headquarters in Ogden.
The move portends more than a boosted tax base and a resurgence for the capital's oft-overlooked Weber County cousin. It symbolizes a defeat of sorts for Salt Lake City.
And, industry insiders say, Ogden's successful sales pitch marks a seismic shift in northern Utah's reputation as an outdoor playground by widening the region's recreation reach.
"We are the Silicon Valley now," says Black Diamond CEO Peter Metcalf, who pioneered Utah's outdoor-rec trail by moving his now-global skiing and climbing company to east Salt Lake County in 1991.
"This isn't an Ogden vs. Salt Lake vs. Park City thing, but a Utah thing," Metcalf says. "It's an ecosystem of companies. We're absolutely all winning."
Still, the loss of Amer Sports stings for Salt Lake City, where Mayor Rocky Anderson rolled out the crimson carpet by offering redevelopment money and jogging at dawn in City Creek with Amer executives.
The sweat and swag weren't enough.
Close contest
Mike Dowse, president of Amer Sports, concedes that the contest between Salt Lake City and Ogden was close.
"At the end, there were two things: The cost structure for Ogden is still a fair amount lower than for Salt Lake . . . and it is right on the edge of the mountains," he says.
The cost issue was twofold. Not only could the company find reasonably priced space in the renovated American Can campus, Dowse says, but also its employees could "find homes they can afford."
Salt Lake City dangled redevelopment funding for downtown's Boston Building, Patrick Dry Goods Building and part of Arrow Press Square - all to no avail.
Besides state incentives and a $4 million parking garage next to the historical building Amer wanted, Ogden offered Amer naming rights for what became the Salomon Center.
Dowse says that gesture was not pivotal, but "it was definitely a contributing factor."
Finland-based Amer Sports is the parent company of Salomon and Atomic skis as well as Suunto watches and Wilson equipment and clothes.
Ogden's newly minted Salomon Center anchors "The Junction," a new city-owned mall, where the climbing wall, wave-riding pool and air tunnel share space with a Gold's Gym and Fat Cats bowling, arcade and miniature golf. There also is a state-of-the-art, Larry Miller-owned megaplex theater, with housing, eateries and office space in the works.
Mayor Matthew Godfrey notes that under the governor's economic-development plan, Salt Lake City (population 179,000) has its own industry "clusters" that it is promoting - biotechnology, biomedical and financial - while Ogden, dubbed "Junction City," has the outdoor-recreation and aerospace niche.
"You can't have a metropolitan area and be a center for recreation," Godfrey says. "It's too big."
By contrast, Ogden is cozier (population 78,000) but still enough of a city to provide recreation companies an urban setting, while sitting much closer to rivers and mountains.
Executives in downtown Ogden can be hiking, mountain biking, rock climbing or bouldering in 15 minutes and, with two rivers running through it, they can be kayaking or throwing a fly line within 10 minutes.
Pineview Reservoir is 20 minutes from Ogden, and Snowbasin Ski Resort, which hosted the downhill during the 2002 Winter Olympics, is 25 minutes away.
The closest Salt Lake City has to a river downtown is City Creek, Godfrey notes. "Geographically, Salt Lake cannot compete with what Ogden has. They should play to their strengths."
Even so, critics wonder if Ogden's overhaul as a recreation play space - Godfrey is pushing construction of a gondola to link downtown to the city's east bench - makes fiscal sense. Many residents worry the city has leveraged its future through the courtship of a single industry.
However, the benefits of snagging Amer are hard to argue. The company, which is expected to generate $26.5 million in new state revenue over 10 years, could draw 230 jobs at more than 300 percent of the Weber County median wage. At the same time, smaller outdoor companies also have recently landed in Ogden.
To be sure, the attractive price of real estate - and the fact that Ogden has been ripe for redevelopment - has played a role. But John Patterson, the city's chief administrative officer, says Ogden's rich history gives it something else: "There's a cool factor associated with Ogden."
Patterson maintains outdoor-recreation companies also are drawn to Ogden because of its size.
"Frankly, we've talked to a number of companies that have chosen Ogden because they feel they can contribute more here, be a corporate citizen that can make a difference here," he says. "They feel like they [would] get lost in the shuffle in Salt Lake."
Utah first
Watching Ogden lure the globe's largest sports-equipment company was a blow, concedes Alison McFarlane, Salt Lake City's senior adviser for economic development. But she downplays the notion of long-term recruitment problems for the capital.
"Ogden has been very successful in re-creating the culture of what Ogden is," McFarlane says. "I don't think Salt Lake City was in the position of having to do that kind of reinvention."
The capital, she notes, must be "broader" in its appeal and approach when courting new companies. Witness the $1 billion-plus invested in downtown's City Creek Center mall makeover.
Besides, McFarlane says, even if the big rec-firm fish escaped Salt Lake City's hook, Amer "landed in our pond, which is what pleases us the most."
"The challenge was not to pit Park City or Salt Lake City against Ogden, but to lure [Amer] to Utah," she says. "A win for anybody in Utah is a win for all of us."
Even so, Dave Hardman, president of the Ogden-Weber Chamber of Commerce, remembers Salt Lake City-based corporate recruiters asking Godfrey for his contacts in the outdoor-recreation industry so the capital could get in on the action.
"They were definitely bothered by us doing it," Hardman says.
Godfrey says he does not remember that. But Jeff Edwards, president and CEO of EDCUtah, says the agency never plays favorites when recruiting businesses.
"It's all connected," he says. "Our goal is to get them to land in the state."
At the same time, Edwards explains, Ogden's plan to cluster its outdoor businesses showed "Ogden was committed to the outdoor-recreation industry in a very unique way."
Curt Geiger, an Ogden native who moved Descente North America to his hometown in 2004, agrees. And he believes Salt Lake City has begun to regard Ogden as it does Park City: a hip side trip for visiting conventioneers and business executives.
Once FrontRunner commuter rail begins delivering passengers from Salt Lake City to downtown Ogden in the spring, the link will be even stronger.
"Salt Lake is beginning to understand that Ogden's revival is an asset to them, not a competitor," Geiger says. "With Frontrunner, we'll be 30 minutes apart. Now the asset begins to make sense to everybody."
Sleepless in SLC?
Ogden's budding renaissance owes much of its outdoor-recreation success to its southern neighbor, according to Metcalf.
"I would be willing to bet a king's ransom that there's no way Amer would relocate to Ogden if Black Diamond and the Outdoor Retailer convention were not in Salt Lake County," he says.
Indeed, both remain behemoths in the industry. And together they helped put the Beehive State on the outdoors map.
At the same time, Rossignol/Quicksilver recently chose Park City to call home and it put a distribution center in Ogden. Just this year, Backcountry.com announced an expansion into Park City and West Valley City, while Smith Sport Optics picked Clearfield for a manufacturing facility. Peregrine Outfitters, a wholesale distributor, also plans an additional warehouse in Ogden.
Despite - or perhaps because of - the suburban flight, McFarlane says Salt Lake City will stay aggressive and diligent in its bid to woo outdoor retailers. But the city's economic-development focus cannot settle on one theme "because of the size of the city."
So, as the memories of 2002 wane, is the creaking Olympic window ready to close on Salt Lake City? Not even close, Edwards insists.
"Utah is still reaping the harvest of the Games," he says, "especially with the outdoor companies. They get it. They understand what happened here. There will be plenty of opportunities for Salt Lake City in the future."
McFarlane wishes the city had had a more aggressive plan in 2002 to capitalize economically on the Olympic flame.
"I'm not aware of any of that having happened," she says. But "I don't think we've lost our luster. We are part of this very small [Olympic] family when you think about it."
That Winter Games window will burst open again in Vancouver come 2010, when the world - and recreation companies across the globe - will be reminded of Salt Lake City's Olympic legacy. And, more important, its landscape.
_______________________________
Ogden has attracted the corporate headquarters, U.S. headquarters or distribution centers of eight outdoor-recreation companies since 2004. Some have only a few employees, but others boast large work forces. Amer Sports, for instance, expects to grow to 230 employees in the coming years. It plans to move into a building at the historic American Can complex next month. The companies are:
* Amer Sports (Salomon, Atomic, Bonfire and Suunto)
* Goode Ski Industries
* Scott
* Rossignol
* Descente (DNA)
* Nidecker
* Kahuna
* SnowSports Interactive
Lower cost of living tips scales for Amer Sport to choose Junction City
By Derek P. Jensen and Kristen Moulton
The Salt Lake Tribune
The 2002 Winter Olympics had Salt Lake City's name, but the Games' economic legacy may belong to Park City and, suddenly, Ogden.
Thirty-five miles north of Utah's capital, the once-moribund railroad hub just unfurled its much-ballyhooed outdoor-recreation center. The sparkling downtown facility - awash in surf streams, a sky-diving tunnel and a massive climbing wall in the shadow of the Wasatch Mountains - bears a brand name of Amer Sports Corp., the world's largest sports-equipment company, which decided last year to plop its North American headquarters in Ogden.
The move portends more than a boosted tax base and a resurgence for the capital's oft-overlooked Weber County cousin. It symbolizes a defeat of sorts for Salt Lake City.
And, industry insiders say, Ogden's successful sales pitch marks a seismic shift in northern Utah's reputation as an outdoor playground by widening the region's recreation reach.
"We are the Silicon Valley now," says Black Diamond CEO Peter Metcalf, who pioneered Utah's outdoor-rec trail by moving his now-global skiing and climbing company to east Salt Lake County in 1991.
"This isn't an Ogden vs. Salt Lake vs. Park City thing, but a Utah thing," Metcalf says. "It's an ecosystem of companies. We're absolutely all winning."
Still, the loss of Amer Sports stings for Salt Lake City, where Mayor Rocky Anderson rolled out the crimson carpet by offering redevelopment money and jogging at dawn in City Creek with Amer executives.
The sweat and swag weren't enough.
Close contest
Mike Dowse, president of Amer Sports, concedes that the contest between Salt Lake City and Ogden was close.
"At the end, there were two things: The cost structure for Ogden is still a fair amount lower than for Salt Lake . . . and it is right on the edge of the mountains," he says.
The cost issue was twofold. Not only could the company find reasonably priced space in the renovated American Can campus, Dowse says, but also its employees could "find homes they can afford."
Salt Lake City dangled redevelopment funding for downtown's Boston Building, Patrick Dry Goods Building and part of Arrow Press Square - all to no avail.
Besides state incentives and a $4 million parking garage next to the historical building Amer wanted, Ogden offered Amer naming rights for what became the Salomon Center.
Dowse says that gesture was not pivotal, but "it was definitely a contributing factor."
Finland-based Amer Sports is the parent company of Salomon and Atomic skis as well as Suunto watches and Wilson equipment and clothes.
Ogden's newly minted Salomon Center anchors "The Junction," a new city-owned mall, where the climbing wall, wave-riding pool and air tunnel share space with a Gold's Gym and Fat Cats bowling, arcade and miniature golf. There also is a state-of-the-art, Larry Miller-owned megaplex theater, with housing, eateries and office space in the works.
Mayor Matthew Godfrey notes that under the governor's economic-development plan, Salt Lake City (population 179,000) has its own industry "clusters" that it is promoting - biotechnology, biomedical and financial - while Ogden, dubbed "Junction City," has the outdoor-recreation and aerospace niche.
"You can't have a metropolitan area and be a center for recreation," Godfrey says. "It's too big."
By contrast, Ogden is cozier (population 78,000) but still enough of a city to provide recreation companies an urban setting, while sitting much closer to rivers and mountains.
Executives in downtown Ogden can be hiking, mountain biking, rock climbing or bouldering in 15 minutes and, with two rivers running through it, they can be kayaking or throwing a fly line within 10 minutes.
Pineview Reservoir is 20 minutes from Ogden, and Snowbasin Ski Resort, which hosted the downhill during the 2002 Winter Olympics, is 25 minutes away.
The closest Salt Lake City has to a river downtown is City Creek, Godfrey notes. "Geographically, Salt Lake cannot compete with what Ogden has. They should play to their strengths."
Even so, critics wonder if Ogden's overhaul as a recreation play space - Godfrey is pushing construction of a gondola to link downtown to the city's east bench - makes fiscal sense. Many residents worry the city has leveraged its future through the courtship of a single industry.
However, the benefits of snagging Amer are hard to argue. The company, which is expected to generate $26.5 million in new state revenue over 10 years, could draw 230 jobs at more than 300 percent of the Weber County median wage. At the same time, smaller outdoor companies also have recently landed in Ogden.
To be sure, the attractive price of real estate - and the fact that Ogden has been ripe for redevelopment - has played a role. But John Patterson, the city's chief administrative officer, says Ogden's rich history gives it something else: "There's a cool factor associated with Ogden."
Patterson maintains outdoor-recreation companies also are drawn to Ogden because of its size.
"Frankly, we've talked to a number of companies that have chosen Ogden because they feel they can contribute more here, be a corporate citizen that can make a difference here," he says. "They feel like they [would] get lost in the shuffle in Salt Lake."
Utah first
Watching Ogden lure the globe's largest sports-equipment company was a blow, concedes Alison McFarlane, Salt Lake City's senior adviser for economic development. But she downplays the notion of long-term recruitment problems for the capital.
"Ogden has been very successful in re-creating the culture of what Ogden is," McFarlane says. "I don't think Salt Lake City was in the position of having to do that kind of reinvention."
The capital, she notes, must be "broader" in its appeal and approach when courting new companies. Witness the $1 billion-plus invested in downtown's City Creek Center mall makeover.
Besides, McFarlane says, even if the big rec-firm fish escaped Salt Lake City's hook, Amer "landed in our pond, which is what pleases us the most."
"The challenge was not to pit Park City or Salt Lake City against Ogden, but to lure [Amer] to Utah," she says. "A win for anybody in Utah is a win for all of us."
Even so, Dave Hardman, president of the Ogden-Weber Chamber of Commerce, remembers Salt Lake City-based corporate recruiters asking Godfrey for his contacts in the outdoor-recreation industry so the capital could get in on the action.
"They were definitely bothered by us doing it," Hardman says.
Godfrey says he does not remember that. But Jeff Edwards, president and CEO of EDCUtah, says the agency never plays favorites when recruiting businesses.
"It's all connected," he says. "Our goal is to get them to land in the state."
At the same time, Edwards explains, Ogden's plan to cluster its outdoor businesses showed "Ogden was committed to the outdoor-recreation industry in a very unique way."
Curt Geiger, an Ogden native who moved Descente North America to his hometown in 2004, agrees. And he believes Salt Lake City has begun to regard Ogden as it does Park City: a hip side trip for visiting conventioneers and business executives.
Once FrontRunner commuter rail begins delivering passengers from Salt Lake City to downtown Ogden in the spring, the link will be even stronger.
"Salt Lake is beginning to understand that Ogden's revival is an asset to them, not a competitor," Geiger says. "With Frontrunner, we'll be 30 minutes apart. Now the asset begins to make sense to everybody."
Sleepless in SLC?
Ogden's budding renaissance owes much of its outdoor-recreation success to its southern neighbor, according to Metcalf.
"I would be willing to bet a king's ransom that there's no way Amer would relocate to Ogden if Black Diamond and the Outdoor Retailer convention were not in Salt Lake County," he says.
Indeed, both remain behemoths in the industry. And together they helped put the Beehive State on the outdoors map.
At the same time, Rossignol/Quicksilver recently chose Park City to call home and it put a distribution center in Ogden. Just this year, Backcountry.com announced an expansion into Park City and West Valley City, while Smith Sport Optics picked Clearfield for a manufacturing facility. Peregrine Outfitters, a wholesale distributor, also plans an additional warehouse in Ogden.
Despite - or perhaps because of - the suburban flight, McFarlane says Salt Lake City will stay aggressive and diligent in its bid to woo outdoor retailers. But the city's economic-development focus cannot settle on one theme "because of the size of the city."
So, as the memories of 2002 wane, is the creaking Olympic window ready to close on Salt Lake City? Not even close, Edwards insists.
"Utah is still reaping the harvest of the Games," he says, "especially with the outdoor companies. They get it. They understand what happened here. There will be plenty of opportunities for Salt Lake City in the future."
McFarlane wishes the city had had a more aggressive plan in 2002 to capitalize economically on the Olympic flame.
"I'm not aware of any of that having happened," she says. But "I don't think we've lost our luster. We are part of this very small [Olympic] family when you think about it."
That Winter Games window will burst open again in Vancouver come 2010, when the world - and recreation companies across the globe - will be reminded of Salt Lake City's Olympic legacy. And, more important, its landscape.
_______________________________
Ogden has attracted the corporate headquarters, U.S. headquarters or distribution centers of eight outdoor-recreation companies since 2004. Some have only a few employees, but others boast large work forces. Amer Sports, for instance, expects to grow to 230 employees in the coming years. It plans to move into a building at the historic American Can complex next month. The companies are:
* Amer Sports (Salomon, Atomic, Bonfire and Suunto)
* Goode Ski Industries
* Scott
* Rossignol
* Descente (DNA)
* Nidecker
* Kahuna
* SnowSports Interactive