July 29, 2017

Dave Ramsey, Gov. Haslam Speak at New HQ Site, Jobs Coming with It

Hundreds came out to celebrate the groundbreaking of Ramsey Solutions new headquarters in Franklin’s Berry Farms Thursday morning.

Gov. Bill Haslam, County Mayor Rogers Anderson and 600 or so Ramsey employees came to the 47-acre stretch just south of the Goose Creek Bypass that is the future home of Ramsey Solutions.

Dave Ramsey said he plans to build an entire complex of buildings there that could eventually employ– and create– thousands of jobs in south Franklin.

For now, Ramsey expects to hire 175 people in the next year, on top of 150 he said came on board in the last six months.

“We have a lot of marketing people coming in, a lot on the sales side, just every type of thing,” he said. “It is exciting the kinds of jobs.”

He also said there will be a lot of technology job hires and administrative support positions.

Ramsey plans to build a whole complex on the site, which is at 4478 Pratt Lane. The first building, which will be more than 223,000 square feet, will include a coffee shop and bookstore for guests watching “The Dave Ramsey Show” live in the studio, as well as office space for more than 1,000 Ramsey Solutions team members. The estimated move in date for the new headquarters is August 2019. After that he plans to build, and build.

“If we fill this campus up over the next however many years, a decade, two, ten, twenty years, that is probably three or four thousand jobs,” he said. “But we don’t have set projections that far out we just hire people as we have things that need doing.”

There is no set timeline beyond the first building, but after the first one, they will start working on the next one, and then likely one after that.

The current $58 million project is funded essentially without any borrowing.

Ramsey, who grew up in Antioch, said he was happy to stay in Tennessee.

“We looked at other sites in other states and were so happy to be able to find a great location right here in Berry Farms,” he said.

The city of Franklin and the county offered property tax incentives to Ramsey to build here, more than $2 million off the site’s property taxes over 10 years in return for creating at least 398 jobs over that time. That will be a total of about $1.87 million off county taxes and $360,000 from city taxes.

A similar deal is in place for another 398 minimum to be added during Phase II. But Ramsey seems to expect to create many more jobs than that.

For that and for building here in Tennessee, Gov. Haslam summed up what he felt Ramsey was doing, and that he agrees with it.

“We don’t create jobs in government, jobs are created when people put capital at risk and that is what is happening right here,” Gov. Haslam said. “And we are grateful when someone decides to put a 200,000 square foot building here, and then another one and then another one. We greatly appreciate it because it means jobs and investment.”

Ramsey said it took longer than he’d have liked but that was because he is doing it without borrowing and going into debt.

In 2015, Ramsey Solutions closed on the land for its growing company. It currently occupies more than 150,000 square feet of office space across multiple locations in Cool Springs.

 

Originally Published in the Williamson Source

By Zach Harmuth