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Iams headquarters moving from Vandalia to Mason

Vandalia Mayor Bill Loy (left) and Jeffrey C. Hoagland, city manager, discuss the decision by Iams to leave Vandalia for Mason during a Thursday, May 28, news conference at the Vandalia Municipal Building.

Staff photo by Chris Stewart Vandalia Mayor Bill Loy (left) and Jeffrey C. Hoagland, city manager, discuss the decision by Iams to leave Vandalia for Mason during a Thursday, May 28, news conference at the Vandalia Municipal Building.

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Staff photo by Ron Alvey Iams is moving their headquarters from their current Vandalia location on Poe Ave. to Mason.

By John Nolan and Jennie Szink
Staff Writer Updated 9:56 PM Thursday, May 28, 2009

VANDALIA — Procter & Gamble Co., which bought the Vandalia-based Iams pet food business for $2.3 billion in 1999, plans to relocate the Iams headquarters and its 240 employees in October to Mason in suburban Cincinnati, P&G said Thursday, May 28.

The Vandalia employees of P&G Pet Care’s North American headquarters will join about 2,000 employees already in Mason at P&G’s Mason Business Center which includes its pharmaceuticals, personal-care and oral-care businesses, company spokesman Jason Taylor said. P&G Pet Care includes the Iams and Eukanuba pet food brands.

“We’re doing this to increase productivity, collaboration and access to P&G’s resources/expertise,” the company said in a statement to its employees.

The relocation will not include the approximately 250 employees assigned to the Iams-Eukanuba pet foods plant and research and development complex in Lewisburg, Preble County, Taylor said. P&G told employees that it is beginning a separate study, that will take several months, on how to increase collaboration and efficiencies at the Lewisburg site.

P&G is relocating the Iams-Eukanuba headquarters because the business has become global and has been gradually more integrated into other sectors of the company, Taylor said. The Vandalia facility on Poe Avenue will be closed.

“This has been a possibility for the past 10 years,” he said.

The business includes Iams and Eukanuba dry and canned dog and cat foods. It has offices in Europe, Australia and Asia.

“Our home address is changing, but not our commitment to improving the well-being of all dogs and cats,” Dan Rajczak, vice president of P&G Pet Care’s business in North America, said in a statement distributed internally to P&G employees Thursday. “If anything, this will help us do an even better job of connecting with our colleagues in health care to bring great innovation to pet care.”

The impending loss of the P&G Pet Care headquarters is just another blow to Vandalia, which lost two other large employers in 2008. Infant products maker Evenflo Co. Inc. moved its headquarters and 150 jobs to Miamisburg. Mazer Corp., an educational publishing services firm, abruptly closed its doors in December. Mazer had about 185 employees as recently as 2006.

Vandalia receives about $12 million in tax revenues annually from all its businesses, and the departure of P&G Pet Care will cost the city 4 to 5 percent of that, or at least $500,000, said Jeff Hoagland, Vandalia’s city manager.

Vandalia had worked hard over the years to keep P&G, Hoagland and Mayor Bill Loy said at a news conference Thursday. In 2004, the city exempted stock options from local taxes — as Cincinnati does — so that P&G wouldn’t be tempted to move Vandalia employees to the company’s Cincinnati headquarters, Hoagland said.

The city had granted P&G two tax breaks, including a current 15-year abatement that runs through 2011, to retain the company, Hoagland said. City officials had talked with P&G two months ago and heard nothing about plans to relocate, he said.

P&G had been a good corporate citizen, helping support local fireworks displays and park programs, and will be missed, Loy said.

Vandalia could more than offset that loss by attracting as many as 700 to 900 jobs within the next four or five years, if two current efforts to attract two potentially large employers with financial incentives are successful, Hoagland said. City officials declined to identify the potential employers.

There was nothing more Vandalia could have done to retain P&G, said Taylor, its spokesman. The relocation is driven by the benefits of giving the pet food employees direct access to other P&G operations in Mason, he said.

The Iams-Eukanuba headquarters is one of the city’s top three employers, city officials said. City spokesman Rich Hopkins declined to release the amount of P&G’s local payroll, saying the city regards that as confidential information.

It is a multimillion-dollar payroll, Taylor said.

Animal nutritionist Paul Iams founded Iams Co. in 1946. Just this week, Vandalia city officials had set up a “salute to local businesses” display box in the municipal building’s lobby that prominently features P&G Pet Care.

Mason Mayor Tom Grossmann said he was pleased to learn of the relocation. He said Mason city officials had not been officially informed in advance.

“Procter & Gamble is one of our top employers and they’ve been a very good partner of ours. We appreciate very much the facility and the people they put there,” Grossmann said.

At the time P&G bought the Iams business from entrepreneur Clayton L. Mathile, the company said it intended to keep the Iams headquarters in Vandalia for at least three to four years while P&G learned more about the pet food business, said Durk Jager, who was then P&G’s chairman and chief executive. Since 1999, sales of Iams and Eukanuba products by P&G —renowned for its marketing prowess — have more than doubled.

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As Queen said 'Another one bites the dust.' It is little wonder that Iams would want to leave the hostile business environment that Montgomery County Commissioners and the Mayor of Dayton have created for the far greener pastures that Mason and Warren County are to businesses.
Time to shake up Montgomery County leadership and also vote out Rhine McLin. What happens in Dayton doesn't stay in Dayton, it spreads throughout the region.

Gwen
1:13 AM, 5/31/2009

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This isn't just a Vandalia problem (actually Vandalia has done a very good job of keeping Iams around this long with the armpit of Ohio just to the south of it). It's more of a Dayton problem. Dayton wasn't that bad 10 years ago. I hate to blame everything on politics, but it seems that the last 8 years have been some of the worst for Dayton. I think that this election, I'm voting against Rhine Mclin. Hopefully, we can get someone in there who has actually owned a business.

Bob
10:37 PM, 5/29/2009

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Once again, another prominent business with a solid payroll says "Goodbye Dayton" ( I know, it's Vandalia!)while our so-called leaders wring their hands and did nothing over the years to keep it. Any bets on how soon NCR is out-a-here? Then we're left with the remains of Lexis/ Nexis & WPAFB to keep this all going. fat chance. I don't think anybody in Dayton / Montgomery County knows anything about economic development; there's no evidence of it.

Down on Dayton
5:42 PM, 5/29/2009

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I personally believe Iams as a company needs to be shut down. I'm a member of PETA and their undercover investigation of the company prooved nothing except how they treat their some 70 "test dogs." Let's just say I won't EVER buy Iams after seeing those pictures.

Allison
4:30 PM, 5/29/2009

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Dayton wasted millions of dollars on the "largest fountain in the world". I guess they found out that squirting water into the air has some inborn limitations. I still can hardly believe they spent that much money with so little engineering. I guess engineering is dead in Dayton. The Wright brothers would be ashamed. Stupid is as stupid does, Forest.

Flo
12:40 PM, 5/29/2009

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