PAULDING, OH – AgCredit, a member owned farm credit lending firm from northwest Ohio, has made the move into a revamped retail space at 839 N. Williams street on the north end of the village. AgCredit was previously located in a temporary office in the Small Business Innovation Center (SBIC). With the announcement of this exciting move, AgCredit will expand their position in Paulding County with their own office space and add at least one additional office member to their team. This is the exact intent the small business center was developed for.
The SBIC came to fruition in December 2015. The thought behind the center was to offer an economical business office setting to young, budding entrepreneurial businesses or established businesses located outside of the immediate area. The office would provide growth potential with space located “on the square” to “test the water” and see if the business received enough community support and foot traffic to establish a business storefront of their own. This in turn could help refurbish or develop an open storefronts in Paulding County. With the AgCredit move, the development is working exactly as hoped.
The SBIC offices are managed by the Paulding County Economic Development office and its board. Previous Economic Development Director Jerry Zielke was instrumental in overseeing the inception of the office space. Jerry managed over many volunteer, and some paid work hours, to complete the renovation of the county owned business building. The incubator office space is located at 103 E. Perry Street, between the Paulding Area Foundation building and the Board of Elections office.
The office space houses a reception type front area and four rentable offices. There is a “community” office desk space toward the back that many community boards use just to work and keep a file cabinet on hand. The far back end of the building is a community board room for meetings or larger gatherings for the rental space office personal. The office space comes complete with furnished utilities including: power, electric, and internet. It comes with a full kitchenette, microwave, refrigerator, and community restrooms. This is a full functioning office space without the full office space owned costs.
Once the downstairs office spaces filled in 2018, there was enough interest to begin the development of the 103 1⁄2 E. Perry upstairs space. Renovation continued throughout 2019. Early in 2020, in conjunction with the Fall Creek Festival board, the PCED Board moved forward with recapping the stairs, bringing carpet into the large office and laminate flooring at both the top and bottom stair landings. This work completed access to an additional three office spaces and two conference room spaces. The larger conference room has been able to host several social distance meetings and social distance trainings in conjunction with NSCC, OMJ and soon to be NOCAC. There is still room for additional expansion that will be renovated and developed as additional need dictates.
This additional upstairs office space allows even more new businesses the opportunity to have a presence in a very high traffic area of Paulding County, while helping the new or young business establish a clientele to build up their business. This summer PCED experienced nearly capacity use of the nine total office spaces. This has helped provide a true understanding of utility and rent costs. Adjustments were made to continue supplying fully equipped office space to new businesses with everything they need to succeed. This now allows the PCED board to have additional funds to maintain present office space and look toward establishing more development.
There are currently two upstairs office spaces available. If you would like to see these available upstairs offices, get on a waiting list for upcoming available office space downstairs, tour the facility, or simply have questions about the Small Business Innovation Center contact Economic Development Director Tim Copsey 419-399-8282.
