Online retailer Wayfair, once Brunswick Landing’s largest employer, will not renew its lease when it expires in May, the company confirmed Tuesday.
“Wayfair has made the decision to not extend facility leases at a number of our customer service locations, including Brunswick,” a company spokesperson wrote. “Like many companies, we have seen an increase in employees effectively transitioning to remote work, driven in part by the COVID-19 global pandemic and cost savings efforts. We remain committed to our local communities, including Brunswick, and will continue to provide support to our regional employees who live and contribute to these communities.”
The Boston-based furniture and home good retailer expanded to Maine in 2016 when it opened a sales and customer service operation in Brunswick. The office was home to more than 500 workers at its peak, making it “by far” the largest employer on the Landing, according to Kristine Logan, executive director of the Midcoast Regional Redevelopment Authority.
After initially hoping to build its Maine workforce to 1,000 employees, Wayfair reversed course when it laid off more than 50 Mainers in February 2020 before closing its Bangor office the following year.
While the company announced Friday it would lay off 1,750, or 10%, of its total workforce, including some Maine-based employees, the decision to move on from Brunswick Landing was a separate cost-saving move made possible by the fact that all but a few dozen locally based workers have worked remotely since the start of the pandemic.
The Priority Real Estate Group has been aware Wayfair does not plan to renew its lease since August and is actively marketing the 40,000-square-foot office space to Maine- and Boston-based companies, according to owner Jim Howard. He said he expects the Midcoast’s high standard of living and the facility’s good condition will be a draw for potential customers.
“I think we’ve got a great workforce here,” Howard said. “According to Wayfair, the production of their office is always some of the highest that they had.”
Despite the rise of remote work and a recent spate of mass layoffs throughout the tech industry, Brunswick Landing is well positioned to continue attracting new businesses to Maine, according to Logan. She said 23 companies moved to the Landing in 2022, and MRRA continues to see a steady stream of interest, particularly from aerospace and biotech startups that need space to build their products.
“A lot of the companies that are locating onto the Landing are folks that need to be in bigger spaces: a lot of manufacturers, a lot of R&D (research and development),” she said. “There’s not a lot of big buildings that are available anymore.”
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