Overstock.com, a large online retailer, will locate a customer service call center at the Satsop Business Park and plans to employ about 150 people.

Port of Grays Harbor commissioners on Wednesday unanimously approved a lease with company for a building in the Satsop Business Park. The call center is slated to open by early spring of 2017.

“Overstock is excited to become a part of the Grays Harbor community with our newest customer care center,” said Overstock.com Senior Vice President Carter Lee. By April of next year, he expects to have 150 employees, hiring about 50 per month after the lease takes effect Jan. 1. “We are going to go pretty quick,” he said. “We’ll probably start hiring and training in February.”

Most of the jobs will be entry level customer service positions, along with some leadership and possibly, in time, web content management positions. The property in the lease is 19,447 square feet of what the Port refers to as the Flex Tech building at 100 Technology Way at the business park. The two story building, with just a few minor improvements, is basically ready to move in to and was attractive for a call center because it comes prewired with fiber optics to provide the high speed connectivity a call center of this size requires. It’s also fully equipped with power and water, air conditioning and heat and even a backup diesel generator.

Also attractive to Overstock was the quality of people found in the area. “Customer service is our hallmark. I’ve found it takes a certain type of person to provide that level of customer care, and the people I’ve met since I got here are just the nicest people I’ve ever met,” said Lee. “I think that will translate well into our customer service.” He added that the health and happiness of employees is important, so “we’ll create a nice break room, and we also have sit/standup work stations,” desks that can be raised so employees can either sit or stand during their shifts.

The Salt Lake City, Utah, company may be new to the region – “this is our first building in the Northwest,” said Lee – they are not new to repurposing properties. A new peace sign-shaped headquarters building recently opened for the company in Midvale, Utah, just south of Salt Lake City, is built on the site of a former slag pile. So, “when I came up here and saw those two towers jutting out, it just felt right,” said Lee.

While Overstock has had employees outside their headquarters before, this is the first time a large group of them will be in one location; the others, in South Carolina, worked from their homes. “It was challenging to manage remotely,” said Lee, adding the Satsop site was a good fit “because we wanted to be within a couple hours’ flight” from the call center.

The Port and Overstock were not alone in making the call center a reality. Alissa Shay, business development manager for the Satsop Business Park, thanked a number of agencies and organizations that helped throughout the process, including Governor Jay Inslee, the Department of Commerce, Greater Grays Harbor Inc., Thurston County Economic Development Council, Grays Harbor College – who plans to partner with Overstock to train employees, Pac Mountain Workforce Development Council, Grays Harbor County and the Grays Harbor PUD.

Overstock’s lease with the Port is for three years, with one three year option and four one year options following, 10 years total if all the options are exercised. The first year’s rent will be just over $93,000, raising to $180,000 in years four through six. After six years the rent will be based on fair market value adjustments in each of the last four years, not to exceed five percent annual increase.

How did Overstock.com come across the Satsop Business Park? “Overstock hired a consultant to help them with site selection, Paul Berendt with Strategies360 (a public relations firm), who happens to be familiar with the Port and Satsop and included us on initial site visits,” said Port executive director Gary Nelson. “It grew from there with the support of our Satsop Business Park staff and the many partners you saw at the meeting today.” As for special incentives to sweeten the deal, “I am not aware of any sweeteners. We are making some modifications to the building to segregate the top floor of the Flex Tech building and are allowing them a $15,000 credit the first year to allow for the creation of a breakroom/lunchroom inside their lease,” said Nelson.

Overstock.com is an online retailer, focusing on furniture and home products but selling just about anything else a person can think of. Lee said the company, founded in 1999 by Patrick Byrne, rakes in about $8 billion a year in sales, employees more than 1,500 people, has their own 800,000 square foot warehouse in Utah and also uses 200 drop shippers around the country to deliver their products. Most of their business is done within the U.S., but the company is experimenting with international deals, most recently Canada.

Overstock.com Senior Vice President Carter Lee addresses Port of Grays Harbor officials, staff and commissioners Wednesday afternoon prior to the commission’s vote approving a lease with the company in the Satsop Business Park. The nearly 20,000 square foot call center that will be created in the Flex Tech building will provide about 150 jobs by May of next year. DAN HAMMOCK THE DAILY WORLD