Fall River’s Quaker Fabric Corp. said it plans to lease a 600,000-square-foot
industrial building on 33.6 acres in the north end of Fall River, instead of
purchasing the facility.
The textiles manufacturer said in a statement that on Sept. 30 it had provided the seller with official notice of its decision to terminate the purchase and sales agreement for the building that was signed in early July. Quaker Fabric announced it would either buy or lease the building in a statement later in that month. The agreement had called for the company to pay $21 million for the property if Quaker had decided to buy it.
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As a result of this change, Quaker Fabric said there would be a charge to the company’s third-quarter pre-tax earnings of approximately $175,000.
“Our proposed leasing arrangement should allow us to realize much of the reduction in our annual long-term operating costs that we had hoped to achieve by buying,” Quaker President and CEO Larry Liebenow said in the statement.
“We acknowledge, with appreciation, the support and assistance we have received from the seller, the city of Fall River – including the mayor’s office, the Fall River Office of Economic Development and the Fall River Redevelopment Authority – the Commonwealth of Massachusetts’ Offices of Economic Affairs and Business Development and our own work force.”
Quaker Fabric announced its decision to purchase or lease the single-story facility in the effort to consolidate several operations into one facility. Currently, the company operates with a total of 2.1 million square feet of manufacturing and warehouse space. The consolidation would reduce annual operating costs by about $3 million starting in the second half of 2005, and also give the company needed space for growth.
