Bryant Rubber moving headquarters to Long Beach, California

HARBOR CITY, Calif.—Bryant Rubber is moving its headquarters for the first time in more than 40 years in large part to benefit its employees with a better location, more access to technology and increased convenience.

The company is relocating from Harbor City to the Long Beach Business Center, which is located six miles east in Los Angeles County and has easy access to nearby freeways such as I-405 and other major transportation arteries. A 10-year lease was signed by the company earlier this year, according to the City of Long Beach and confirmed by Bryant Rubber CEO Brogan Bryant.

The newly renovated space of nearly 44,000 feet is a standalone building and will house the company's manufacturing and research and development center, along with corporate employees and managerial leadership. Roughly 65 percent of that space will be for manufacturing. Corporate and managerial personnel should be in place by the end of this year, with the manufacturing staff completing their move later in 2020, Bryant said.

"We looked at many different options before we selected the location we did here in Long Beach." Bryant said. "We actually chose it because it's the epicenter of where our employees reside, which actually surprised us. It's a great location from a supply chain aspect too."

The place Bryant Rubber is moving to is in an area experiencing significant industrial growth near the port of Long Beach, said Sergio Ramirez, the city's deputy director of economic and property development.

"According to what we're seeing, the industrial vacancy rate in Long Beach is at an all-time low," Ramirez said. "We're seeing vacancy rates of 3 percent or less, which is based largely on demand, especially with more retail and added demand for logistic centers in the area. We call it the Amazon effect."

Jeffrey Morgan, an executive director for global real estate firm Cushman and Wakefield, works at the company's El Segundo office and represented Bryant Rubber in this recent transaction. He was referenced on the Cushman and Wakefield website saying that Bryant Rubber's location in Long Beach should signify to the industry that the company is showcasing itself as a world-class manufacturer.

Morgan also indicated that the excellent condition and move-in benefits of the location were a major factor in Bryant Rubber's decision.

Bryant declined to confirm the number of employees the company has or its recent revenue, but said that the company's Mexico division in Tijuana, which opened in 2014, is stable and profitable. As a result, corporate leadership felt the present was a good time to invest more in U.S. operations. Bryant said clients in the aerospace industry and low-volume, high-mix projects will be emphasized in the new location.

"We've always been a great molding company but now we'll turn our attention to program development," Bryant said. "That includes prototype tooling and design work. We can offer value in form and function. For a while now, we've encouraged our customers to reach out to us on the upfront design work they need."

Terms of the lease deal and investment by Bryant Rubber to transfer to the new site were not disclosed.

Founded in 1971, Bryant Rubber is a leader in tight tolerance precision molded components for customers in such industries as aerospace, automotive, food and beverage, medical, telecommunications, and gas and fluid regulation, among others. The company is estimated to have about 150 employees according to its Bloomberg online profile, and manufactures a wide range of gaskets, packing and sealing devices.

Furthermore, Bryant Rubber has benefited from developing a diverse and sophisticated set of core competencies in both molding and overmolding, clean room environments, secondary operations, automated products and vision inspection that, the company's website states, helps to "set it apart from all others in our industry."

The move to Long Beach also is symbolic of the company's continued growth efforts and the fact that it simply outgrew its home of more than four decades.

"For a family-run business this is a monumental decision." Bryant said. "We needed a larger footprint. We started as a storage shed in 1971 and now we have the best work environment for our headquarters that we've ever had."