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V O L . X X I V N O. X V I I I A U G U S T 2 0 , 2 0 1 8 12 "It's a resource that's, I won't say hidden," Appleton says, "but it's not getting the visibility it deserves." Finishing around the edges Loring's fortunes have varied widely. Since 1997, ten- ants have included the U.S. Department of Defense's Defense Finance and Accounting Service Center and the U.S. Department of Labor's Job Corps. e Maine Military Authority, a quasi-governmental businesses that refurbishes military and mass-transit vehicles, opened at Loring around 1997 and grew to occupy half a million square feet of space. In addition to British Cycle Supply, other ten- ants include stainless food service equipment manufacturer SFE Manufacturing, ink manu- facturer Graphic Utilities, the millwork shop of Caribou-based S.W. Collins Co., Pineland Farms and Frontier Transport. In 2017, Joseph Alosa Sr., owner of Concord, N.H.- based New England Kenworth, opened a Kenworth dealership and TRP Truck Parts location at Loring. Alosa also opened Loring Industries to specialize in vehicle, equipment and component refurbishment. At one time, nearly all of Loring's large buildings were full. "Eight or nine years ago, our major concern was to fi nish marketing some smaller facilities because that's all we had left," says Carl Flora, president and CEO of the Loring Development Authority, the organization that owns, manages and oversees the redevelopment of Loring Commerce Centre. "We were just kind of fi nishing around the edges." e facility hit a plateau around 2010. e Maine Military Authority scaled back to less than half of its square footage and shed 450 employees. A couple of small businesses closed or moved on. Other busi- nesses have already closed or relocated, including a bowling center, golf course, wood products company and a call center, which moved to Caribou. Can-do attitude Today, Flora sees interest from potential investors and also potential for expansion by tenants like Loring Industries. "We have signifi cant investor interest in transit and air cargo right now," says Flora. Appleton was impressed when Flora fi rst showed him around. He bought a 7,500-square-foot building and several acres. Despite high fuel costs and the bur- den of shoveling snow, Appleton says disadvantages are outweighed by the support provided by Flora and his team, who helped choose the building, get it operational and arrange a mortgage. "We never ran into a 'You can't do this' situation," Appleton says. "It's, 'Let's fi gure out how to make this happen.'" He's also impressed by the workforce. "People are resourceful," he says. After hir- ing a Caribou woman, "I gave her the keys and a credit card and — this is a 7,500-square-foot place — she set it up, laid it out in accordance with OSHA rules and got it going. And there's good, steady staff . It was hard getting steady, reliable staff in New Jersey, where the society is more mobile. It's really nice when you're hiring a person who grew up in the area and everyone knows them." A testing ground Ben Glass is CEO of Altaeros, which he co-founded in 2010 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Altaeros uses Loring to test prototypes of its tethered aerial platform, which delivers high-speed mobile broadband to rural communities. Investors include SoftBank Group Corp., Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Suhail Bahwan Group, according to its website. Glass found Flora and his team eager to accom- modate the project, which found the enormous indoor space it needed in Loring's 92-foot-high arch hangar, plus open airspace. e Altaeros systems uses a helium- fi lled aerostat, something like a small blimp. "If you look for that combination of two things, there's not that many places," says Glass. Loring provided trucks and equipment, kept areas plowed and provided housing. "Especially early on, in 2011, we were a small start-up and not a lot of resources. Carl was super helpful in making it aff ordable for us to come up there," says Glass. P H O T O / L A U R I E S C H R E I B E R An industrial park with room Loring site 'not getting the visibility it deserves' B Y L A U R I E S C H R E I B E R F O C U S F or British Cycle Supply Co. in Nova Scotia, complicated logistics make it cheaper to import U.K. motorcycle parts to the United States. So when it closed its New Jersey warehouse, owner Mark Appleton sought an another U.S. loca- tion. For proximity, northern Maine made sense. "A real estate agent said, 'Have you tried Loring?'" Appleton recalls. "I said, 'What's Loring?'" e agent was referring to Limestone's Loring Commerce Centre, which, with 8,700 acres and hun- dreds of buildings, is Maine's largest industrial park. Repurposed from the former Loring Air Force Base, which closed in 1994, it's since evolved into a commercial, industrial and aviation park that is today home to 28 employers and over 800 work- ers (and as many as 1,500 employees in the past). Yet it has substantial room for more business development in existing buildings and on develop- able sites. It's supported by high-capacity munici- pal utility infrastructure and a newly constructed dark fi ber network. In Aroostook County, Loring Development Authority President and CEO Carl Flora is pictured at Loring Commerce Centre's arch hangar, which may be a bit weathered but has room for aircraft and growing companies.

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