Staples, the world’s largest office supply company, will be closing its $2 million call center on Highlandia Drive when its lease expires at the end of this year, if not before. Property owner Randy Poche, whose Baton Rouge-based Superior Office Products owns the building in which Staples has been leasing 20,000 square feet of space since 2007, tells Daily Report he was notified earlier this year of Staples’ plans and expects the company to be out before December.
“They had a five-year lease with an option to renew for five years, and they chose not to renew,” Poche says. “So Louisiana will lose those jobs, at least for now.”
When the company announced its plans to open the so-called virtual contact center and training facility in mid-2007, it promised to bring 400 jobs to the area. A local Staples office manager says the facility was employing 200 workers until earlier this year. It currently employs 91.
BRAC spokesman Mike Odom confirms BRAC has been notified of the closure and attributes the closure to “a nationwide real estate consolidation.” When the call center was announced five years ago, BRAC and Mayor Kip Holden’s office trumpeted the deal as a shared economic development success story.
The city-parish provided $150,000 in incentives over three years to lure Staples to the area, and the state kicked in more than $300,000 from a Hurricane Katrina Rapid Response Fund. Odom says the chamber “will continue to recruit new companies and assist local companies with expansion plans in order to ensure that there are new job openings.”
As for the soon-to-be vacated office space, Poche says he and his partner in the building, developer Donnie Jarreau, plan to reconfigure the space and lease it as shared office space to three or four tenants. Poche says he plans to use an additional 10,000 available square feet in the building beginning next year to house a business venture he is launching.
