Chiquita moving HQ to Charlotte? (Columbus, Cincinnati: bankrupt, tenants, living)

[neilworms2]

Originally Posted by abr7rmj
Cincinnati's Hispanic community continues to grow. The recent addition of a 24-hour all-Spanish radio station attests to that.

From the Enquirer this week:

The Hispanic population in Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky - an estimated half of which are Mexican or of Mexican descent - has more than doubled in the past decade to 53,400.

"It accounts for almost 25 percent of Greater Cincinnati's population growth," said Neil Comber, an organizer of the local Hispanic Heritage Month and member of the Bridges for a Just Community board.

Hispanic Fest starts Saturday | Cincinnati.com | cincinnati.com
I don't doubt at all that it has grown (it is growing everywhere). However, 53,400 represents the number of Hispanic folks in the entire metro area (a metro area of nearly 2.3 million people). That's a very small percentage of the population when compared to southern cities. That's all I was saying.

At the county level, Hamilton county only has about 21,000 Hispanics. The cities that Chiquita are looking at have much larger Hispanic populations (including Charlotte, which was a surprise to me).

I think an anecdotal way of putting is this, how many places can you get Horchata in the Cincinnati area? ;-)

I didn't even know the drink existed until I moved, and now I see it EVERYWHERE.

Also with the Asian operations is Chiquita doing operations in India or in East Asia? Its my understanding that a very large chunk of the 2% asian pop in Cincy is from India.

[Cleveland_Collector]

Originally Posted by unusualfire

Honestly 4 million is peanuts to a F500 company. Any state can match or beat that with more incentives. Chiquita must be in more trouble than we know.

I doubt it. It's likely annualized for an undisclosed amount of years. The total incentive is likely in the high tens of millions. Otherwise, it wouldn't be worth it for them to move. Although, all you really need to read in that article is this:

"Chiquita signed a 16-month lease extension at its headquarters building in downtown Cincinnati earlier this year, where it occupies 115,000 square feet. The renewal was designed to give the company time to negotiate a headquarters retention agreement with the state of Ohio or relocate to another state."

And, there you have it. Just another money grubbing corporation looking for a handout.

[abr7rmj]

Chiquita will stay if Ohio meets their needs.

Chiquita CEO Fernando Aguirre said this to the Buisiness Courier this summer:

“If we reach a good agreement with the state of Ohio the most likely scenario is that we will stay,” he said. “I cannot complain about the level of effort and commitment from the state, not this time.”
In 2006, Aguirre criticized a lack of effort in retaining the consumer brands company among local economic development officials.
But now, Aguirre said Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Director of Job Creation Mark Kvamme have shown a strong interest in retaining Chiquita. He adds that Delta Air Lines and the managers of the Greater Cincinnati Northern Kentucky International Airport have met several times with Chiquita to discuss a lack of commercial service to Europe, California and South America.

I'd love to know if Delta can or will do anything here? They kept the direct service from Cincy to Paris, but stopped the London and Amsterdam service for some reason, despite them usually always being full flights. Maybe a return to London or Amsterdam service would be a deal clincher? There are already numerous direct daily flights to California (LAX, San Diego, SF); South American service wouldn't be realistic, but I doubt Charlotte offers much in that department either. It still takes a connection through Atlanta, Miami or Chicago to get to SA.

And if Delta is unresponsive, it's time to bring in a carrier such as JetBlue, which doesn't currently serve any cities in the entire region.

[urbancharlotte]

Originally Posted by abr7rmj

I'd love to know if Delta can or will do anything here? They kept the direct service from Cincy to Paris, but stopped the London and Amsterdam service for some reason, despite them usually always being full flights. Maybe a return to London or Amsterdam service would be a deal clincher? There are already numerous direct daily flights to California (LAX, San Diego, SF); South American service wouldn't be realistic, but I doubt Charlotte offers much in that department either. It still takes a connection through Atlanta, Miami or Chicago to get to SA.

And if Delta is unresponsive, it's time to bring in a carrier such as JetBlue, which doesn't currently serve any cities in the entire region.

Here are some airport stats...

As of July, the Charlotte-Douglas International Airport had 697 daily departures with nonstop service to 138 destinations, making it the seventh highest trafficked airport in the United States. It also offers nonstop international travel to 36 destinations, including London, Madrid, Mexico City, Munich, Paris and Rome.

The Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport offers nonstop service only to Paris, down from five European destinations in 2005. Nonstop flights to U.S. cities have shrunk to 52, down from 130 in 2005. Daily departures are down to 191 flights from more than 600 six years ago.

City says it will fight for Chiquita | NKY.com | cincinnati.com

The fact that Chiquita has extended its contract to 2012 is a sign that the company is not interested in leaving. If the airport issue is fixed by then, I suspect they will stay.

[Cleveland_Collector]

It has nothing to do with the airport. That's just a lot of smoke. People fly in and out of and do much business in US cities every single day that have much less in the way of airport capabilities and routes than CKY. They use things like this as "leverage" because they know that it's totally out of the state's control. They then move for monetary concessions which, with Kasich and crew, they know are as good as in their pockets.

[unusualfire]

Moving south won't make them a 10 billion dollar company. They need to buy other companies to increase revenue.

I would let them go. They are no longer a Fortune 500 company. Haven't been for a few years now. Ohio should easily be able to match North Carolina. They won't get a 100 million dollar deal NCR got with Atlanta.

Moving to Miami may cost the company more money to operate, since real estate is much higher down there and they will have to pay their employee's more income.

[kjbrill]

Cleveland_Collector... You mean there are actually people who can see through the subterfuge? After exploiting the regions which produce their product for decades, Chiquita now wants to exploit the area which distributes it. Large corporations at their very worse.

[Cleveland_Collector]

Of course. And, the agri-biz culture is one of the worst.

[t45209]

The one thing that surprises me is that if South American air travel is so important to them that they do not invest in a corporate jet (or do they?). Many Cincinnati companies of all sizes maintain corporate aircraft at Lunken and find them to be quite cost effective. A Citation X jet holds 8 passengers comfortably and can get as far as Chile with one stop for gas. Chiquita only has 300 or so people, so how many are flying at any one time?

[abr7rmj]

Originally Posted by t45209

The one thing that surprises me is that if South American air travel is so important to them that they do not invest in a corporate jet (or do they?). Many Cincinnati companies of all sizes maintain corporate aircraft at Lunken and find them to be quite cost effective. A Citation X jet holds 8 passengers comfortably and can get as far as Chile with one stop for gas. Chiquita only has 300 or so people, so how many are flying at any one time?

This is a very good point. Even if they're based in Charlotte, they're still at least one or two stops from their South American destinations anyway. A corporate jet would surely be beneficial.

If anything, it sure would help if Cincinnati or Chiquita could convince Delta to resume the CVG-Amsterdam flight that they stopped a couple of years ago. That being said, there is no direct Charlotte - Amsterdam flight either.