Graphic Packaging Is Leaving Marietta

Graphic Packaging made official today what had been rumored since the summer: It’s moving its corporate headquarters east from Marietta to Sandy Springs.

The company will move into the RiverEdge Summit complex in January 2013, said in a press release, abandoning four buildings in Marietta.

"We hate to see any company leave the city, but we understand that they have needs that weren't being met," Marietta City Economic Development Manager Beth Sessoms said. "We are doing everything we can to encourage local business in Marietta and are hoping we can refill the space fairly quickly."

The maker of paperboard and other packaging products for food, beverages and other consumer goods now manages more than 13,000 employees at 60 facilities from a complex on Livingston Court in southeast Marietta.

But thanks to a package of Sandy Springs incentives, is taking its executive team, corporate staff, North American operational headquarters, Product Development Center and Global Innovation Center to Fulton County.

"The consolidation of our workforce will enhance the impact of our 'one culture' message, which makes the Sandy Springs office complex an excellent location for a major corporate headquarters," Graphic Packaging President and CEO David Scheible said in the press release.

Graphic Packaging will receive a waiver of two years’ worth of business taxes, worth up to $75,000 each year, as well as a $35,000 impact fee and a $3,887 permit fee, the Sandy Springs Reporter said.

“I commend the collaborative effort put forth by the city of Sandy Springs to make this project a reality. The incentives were a key factor in our decision,” Phil Geminder, the vice president of Graphic Packaging Business Systems, said in a Sandy Springs announcement.

Sandy Springs said it will gain almost 300 jobs, and the move will generate $356,000 a year in property taxes for the city and county. The city’s announcement said Graphic Packaging will fill almost 110,000 square feet of office space.

The move has been expected since the Atlanta Business Chronicle reported in late July that Graphic Packaging was the company behind Project Gamma, Sandy Springs’ code name for an incentives package it developed to lure a corporate headquarters.

Brooks Mathis, the vice president of economic development for the Cobb Chamber of Commerce, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution at the time that the move would be a huge blow for Marietta and Cobb County.