A city councillor believes Sarnia-Lambton should aggressively push to bring warehousers and other big businesses to the area.
Bill Dennis said there's an opportunity for large companies to leave crowded and expensive areas and move into the more competitively priced local market.
"We're competing not only on a regional scale but on a global scale," said Dennis. "We have to work together. It seems like in the past we haven't been as unified. We all have to check our egos at the door and work together as a community because if we're divided we simply won't be successful in attracting these companies to the area."
Industrial real estate in Toronto is priced at an average of $13 per square foot.
According to Coldwell Banker Broker Lou Longo, companies here would pay anywhere between $7.50 and $12 per square foot depending on things like the condition of the site, quality of buildings, location, and storage capacity.
"The problem we have here in Sarnia is that we don't have a large inventory of industrial buildings available for lease right now or to purchase," said Longo. "It's hampering a little bit in terms of bringing in new industrial users. If we had more land available to build, then it would definitely be a big asset for us."
Longo said before the pandemic, there were at least six out-of-town companies that had expressed interest in locating to Sarnia-Lambton. The current situation has halted those plans, at least for now.
"The other problem is, it's tough for a developer or somebody to build a 20 or 30 thousand square foot building and have it sit empty, and that's the problem that we're having. In the GTA, large companies and landlords will build a building and have it sit there and wait. We don't have these large companies that are prepared to spend $5 million or $10 million and have it just sit there. You look at the industrial park that the city built on London Line, how long has that been sitting there? There's all of that vacant land there, and there is only three or four companies there."
Councillor Dennis said the unemployment rate in Sarnia-Lambton is over 15 per cent and attracting more business to the region will be key to fixing that.
He said municipalities across Ontario are going to be heavily competing with others for business opportunities and tourism dollars.
He said if Sarnia-Lambton wants to take advantage of that, we need to set ourselves apart and highlight all the county has to offer, including a skilled workforce, good cost of living, and close proximity to the United States.
Locally, there are two industrial properties for sale with buildings on them, ten for lease, and one piece of vacant land.
That includes a few parcels of land available in the Plank Road and Gladwish Drive area, and on Confederation Street.
-With files from Colin Gowdy