Pa. company relocating HQ to city

Submitted photo
From left, John Miles, president / CEO of Steelite International, Youngstown Mayor Jamael Tito Brown and Youngstown’s 1st Ward Councilman Julius Oliver on Thursday at Steelite’s downtown showroom at the Commerce Building for an announcement the company is relocating its headquarters and about 75 employees to the Taft Technology Center, also downtown.

YOUNGSTOWN — Steelite International, a New Castle-Pa.-based supplier in the hospitality industry, plans to relocate its executive headquarters and the 75 or so employees who work there to the Taft Technology Center downtown.

The move centralizes the company’s local operations; Steelite already has its largest showroom and experience center at the downtown Commerce Building, 201 E. Commerce St., just a few blocks away.

The showroom opened in 2017.

“So once we got the showroom here, people began to come from all over the world and the next thing was we had grown out of our offices in New Castle. And it just made sense we look at Youngstown because we are here so much entertaining and working with customers,” John Miles, president / CEO of Steelite, said.

On Thursday, Steelite announced it has signed a 60-day exclusivity agreement to lease the space with the building’s owner, the Youngstown Business Incubator, pending completion of funding arrangements with the city and Team NEO, an economic development organization in northeast Ohio.

The plan is to be in the building by October.

“The space is in fantastic shape, but in order to it to be functional for us, there is a significant amount of investment that needs to be put into the building,” Miles said.

It’s estimated the improvements will cost $2 million to $3 million.

The company plans to maintain its presence in New Castle, where operations, distribution and light manufacturing are located. Steelite has more than 100 production factories across the globe, but its largest is in the town of Stoke-on-Trent, a city in central England.

“What is moving to Youngstown is the global headquarters, so executive offices, the marketing department, the finance department, product management, all of the business support functions,” Miles said.

The company provides tableware, buffet equipment and lighting solutions in the hospitality industry, from hotels to restaurants to convention centers to cruise ships to stadiums. According to the company’s website, it produces more than 500,000 pieces of tableware per week and ships to 140 countries.

It has other domestic showrooms in Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and Washington, D.C., and internationally in London and Toronto.

Guy Coviello, president and CEO of the Youngstown / Warren Regional Chamber, praised city officials, including Mayor Jamael Tito Brown, and Barb Ewing, YBI chief executive.

“We’re extremely grateful for John’s decision, and this is probably the biggest announcement for downtown Youngstown in more than 50 years,” Coviello said. “Because, I bet it has been more than 50 years since a company has decided to relocate their company headquarters to downtown Youngstown.”