Steel company to move to Moses Lake

Morse Steel to close Wenatchee location

MOSES LAKE - A Bellevue, Wash.-headquartered steel company is closing its Wenatchee office and building a larger facility in Moses Lake that will have extra room for rebar work.

Morse Steel Service started constructing a 58,000-square-foot building off Wheeler Road near Moses Lake, stated Jonathan Smith of the Grant County Economic Development Council.

It's expected the new business will hire between 18 to 20 people, but about half are expected to transfer from the Wenatchee office, according to Smith.

There's a crew of about 12 people at the Wenatchee location and a couple of employees there will likely choose not to move to Moses Lake, said Mike Morse, the company's president, on Thursday.

Morse said the company is just beginning construction and ordered a metal building for the site. The building will be delivered as soon as the foundation is poured next week, he explained.

Ground work and connecting a new rail spur to the main property is done, Morse said.

"We're excited about this thing," he said. "It's going to be a fun project. Moses Lake is the perfect spot for this."

Morse stated the company was attracted to Moses Lake due to the area's geography. Having direct access to Interstate 90 will allow the company to move its product north to Canada and south to the Tri-Cities and Oregon, he stated.

"We can also easily cover our current North Central Washington territory daily from this location," he noted. "This geography allows us to provide shorter lead time on material to all of our customers east of the mountains."

The Moses Lake site is located in the Wheeler Corridor industrial area on 12 acres. Morris Steel bought the site land from Central Terminal, said Terry Brewer, the economic development council's executive director.

The Moses Lake facility will be larger than the Wenatchee facility and the building will have room and equipment to cut, shape and ship rebar, which is steel reinforcement that goes into poured concrete, Brewer said.

The company didn't have enough room or equipment to work with rebar in Wenatchee, he said. So they handled rebar in the Bellingham shop and shipped it from there, he said.

Rail was an important component to their site selection, Brewer said. Morse Steel will build a new rail spur with its own money and extend rail to its building site, Brewer added.

As a wholesaler to retailers, the business will probably be the only one of its type in Moses Lake and Grant County, Brewer said.

The company expects to start hiring for the new plant in February 2009. The business needs equipment operators, inside sales-people, forklift-and crane-proficient warehouse workers and an office employee.

Bob Morse, the company's board chairperson, stated they "received wonderful assistance from everyone. The EDC really helped us push through a lot of site location issues in a short time frame."

He also commented about how Pamp Maiers and Bob Fancher "were very committed to our project and worked hard to help us acquire the property we needed."

"I think they're going to be a great small employer in our community," Brewer said. "They're one with a great history of taking care of their customers and employees."