Xerox Corp. helped build the modern office, which today often has more multifunction devices that scan, copy and fax than it does pencil sharpeners.
In churning out first office and then commercial printing equipment, Xerox in turn helped build the town of Webster. The company's sprawling Wilson Center for Technology campus of buildings started with a series of land purchases between 1954 and 1965. At its peak, the campus occupied more than 1,000 acres.
But the campus today is far from that peak.
When Gary Bonadonna Sr. started with Xerox in 1973, the Webster site was bustling with 4,500 hourly workers, mostly in manufacturing, he recalled. Today, as manager of the Rochester Regional Joint Board, Bonadonna heads a union that represents 1,100 hourly Xerox workers on a 780-acre campus.
Early this year, the company sold an employee fitness facility and nearly 75 acres of land west of Phillips Road to the town. That move came atop the demolition in 2006 of a pair of warehouses known as Buildings 200 and 215. And the company sold 240 unused acres north of Caracas Drive to a developer for $2 million in 2009.
But the campus received a major injection of life this summer when Xerox relocated most of the 1,100 workers it had at a Henrietta facility to Webster. The Henrietta building is being sold to military radio manufacturer Harris RF Communications. Some who had worked in Henrietta were moved to Xerox Square in downtown Rochester.
Of the company's 6,800 Rochester-area workers, about 1,500 are at Xerox Square and the rest in Webster.
When negotiating a new contract with the Rochester Regional Joint Board earlier this year, Xerox promised consolidation of some manufacturing and distribution into Webster, "which is a good sign," Bonadonna said.
Now the company is trying to find uses for two surplus buildings, 114 and 200, and its property west of Phillips Road, which includes 88 acres and a small cluster of buildings.
"It's fair to say we're looking at all kinds of different alternatives for the site" west of Phillips, said Robert G. Greenslade, vice president of global workplace services and solutions.
Those alternatives could involve selling more property. "If there were interested parties, we're always interested in looking at further consolidations," said David Person, vice president of global real estate strategy and planning.
Added Greenslade, "If we have to wait for the right customer or business partner, we'll do it. We didn't push a timeframe with Henrietta. It so happened the stars aligned and Harris needed to consolidate their manufacturing. It'd be the same here. Obviously we'd like to do something in the next five years. We know we've got too much space."
Toner plant
The Webster complex at its beginning was dedicated to manufacturing. The company over time has rehabilitated some buildings for mixed use of offices and laboratories, said Willem Appelo, president of the Xerox Global Business and Services Group. In recent years, the company has made some noteworthy investments in the campus, including the construction in 2007 of a $60 million toner plant and a major upgrade the following year involving installation of six 25,000-gallon tanks to handle another kind of toner.
On a lesser scale, the company has redone the lobby of Building 105 and some other campus structures. But with the economic downturn, "we put a lot of those plans on hold," Appelo said.
While Webster's economy used to revolve largely around Xerox, the town's retail and sports facility growth has given it diversity, as have town efforts to encourage development along Route 104 and Basket Road, said Supervisor Ronald Nesbitt. The shrinkage of the Webster campus hasn't hurt the town, at least in terms of housing growth, he said.
The relocated Henrietta workers, along with their potential spending in the town and village of Webster, "is an economic boon to me," Nesbitt said.
Xerox still plays a major role in the local economy. The campus provided much of the impetus for construction of a Holiday Inn Express on Holt Road in 2007, general manager Mike Muench said.
Largest site
Webster remains Xerox's largest manufacturing site in the world. It makes products including fusers, photoreceptors, toner and high-end iGen4 and Nuvera digital printing presses. Xerox also has sizable manufacturing sites in Dundalk, Ireland, and Wilsonville, Ore.
The Webster spread is somewhat of an anachronism in modern business. "People don't build campuses like this one anymore with so much infrastructure and so much bricks and mortar," said Appelo.
Selling surplus Webster property could be a challenge.
"Webster is not the center of the universe," said Larry Glazer, chief executive of Rochester real estate development firm Buckingham Properties. "You're not on 490, 390, 90. For distribution purposes, it's not ideal."
Xerox would face the additional challenge of Eastman Kodak Co.'s ongoing marketing of surplus buildings and land at Eastman Business Park.
Beyond the influx of Henrietta workers, Webster likely won't see its employee base grow substantially.
"I don't think we're in a massive growth mode with engineering," Greenslade said. "Could it happen? I wouldn't say no. But I wouldn't say the odds are high."
MDANEMAN@DemocratandChronicle.com
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