Sharing; Brunswick Business Center ... a place where businesses can pool their resources

(Note: With grateful appreciation to the Times Record for giving us permission to use this article.)

photo: Troy R. Bennett/The Times Record

Elizabeth_Dorsey@TimesRecord.Com
03/09/2005

BRUNSWICK

Rent is cheap when you run a business out of your house.

But when it comes time to expand, a growing business faces a whole range of new costs. Beyond a new lease payment, there's also the cost of equipment, furniture, phone and Internet services, snow plowing, utilities and new staff to name just a few.

Brunswick resident Art Boulay faced this formidable financial circumstance two years ago when he began looking to expand his consulting business outside his Federal Street house.

"I have always wanted a receptionist, all the fancy office equipment, high tech phones and large conference room on demand, but cannot justify the expense," he said.

Rather than shell out the money, which would have been extravagant for the 11-year-old business and its 3.5 employees, Boulay created the Brunswick Business Center, a place where businesses can pool their resources to pay for all the things they need to be successful.

Set to open later this month in a soon-to-be-renovated house at 18 Pleasant St., the building eventually will be filled, Boulay hopes, with small businesses, local representatives of larger businesses and home-based operations that need space to meet with clients.

"To the world, you would look like a much bigger operation," he said. "You get all the accouterments without the overhead. Everything is included in your rent."
 
In addition, each business would pay only for the services it uses, whether it's a once-a-month meeting in the 40-person conference room or full-time use of a large ground-floor office, replete with hardwood floors, stained-glass windows, and a receptionist right outside the door.

After a yearlong search for a building, Boulay found a place for the business center in the 94-year-old house that once served as a dentist's office. Boulay purchased the building for $510,000 from Sweetser mental health services in March 2004. Sweetser continued to rent from Boulay until December, when the agency moved to its new facility on Bath Road. Boulay then set to work renovating the 5,400-square-foot house to fit the concept he envisioned.

Builders are in the process of dividing it into 21 separate office spaces, which range from the spacious, first-floor corner room to the more modest third-floor cubicle spaces. They're also outfitting the building for state-of-the-art communications equipment, increased power usage and air conditioning.

In addition to making the building functional, Boulay also is working to restore some of the historic architectural details. He hired Maine artist Terri Parker to restore and strengthen the stained-glass windows throughout the building. He also uncovered an old fireplace that had been hidden behind a wall and is re-finishing a mahogany staircase that had been painted over.

Later this month, Boulay's consulting business, OPI Inc., will become the first tenant.

Besides full-time tenants such as Boulay, the business center can also serve businesses that need space part time.

A traveling sales representative who passes through Brunswick a few times a month, for example, could come in to use the phone and Internet, hold a video conference or send faxes, eliminating the need to do these things in hotel lobbies or copy centers or for the parent office to open up an underutilized satellite office.

For Fred Burgess, who has been an investment adviser for 25 years - the last two years from his Topsham home - the business center will provide a place to house the two new employees he wants to hire. Burgess' company, Regent Financial Services, will move to the new location by April 15, he said.

"We could rehab an entire office or take up space in a traditional office, but you end up taking up more space than you need," Burgess said, adding that the business center also will offer space for him to meet with his clients, something he currently does at Curtis Memorial Library.

The Brunswick Business Center is the first of its kind locally, but such enterprises are common in larger cities, including Portland.

The Executive Office Center in Portland has been around for 28 years. Portland Business Center, which offers cubicle space to tenants on an hourly basis on up to full time, opened in October 2003 on Congress Street. It was so successful, according to Dean Barron, one of the principals, the company opened another one up the street a year later, is currently building one in Westbrook and has plans for four more. By sharing overhead costs, businesses can save thousands of dollars each month, Barron said.

"It gets people out of their houses," he said.

In Brunswick, rent at the business center will run from $50 to $100 a month for third-floor cubicle space up to about $700 a month for one of the larger offices. The cost, Boulay points out, includes everything, all the accouterments Boulay wanted, but didn't think he could afford, for his own small business.

"In this way, a small business gets a big business image, without the expense and overhead, and a big business can have a local presence without the expense and overhead," Boulay said.

Above: Teri Parker of Richmond
restores a stained glass window at
18 Pleasant Street
photo: Troy R. Bennett/The Times Record