Greater Reading Economic Partnership (GREP)

Greater Reading Economic Partnership (grep) program service accomplishments in 2018 included: working with developers that will create over 650 acres and almost 7.5 million square feet of new industrial building development in berks county in next 1 3 years. Worked with more than 110 berks county companies and small businesses to make them aware of the resources available to help them grow and retain jobs in berks county.the impact of our marketing results in over 750 jobs being created and retained in berks county.providing data through greaterreadingsites.com for over 10 million sf and 850 acres available for commercial and industrial investment. Grep successfully positioned berks county/greater Reading as a regional partner with easy access to large metro markets. Greater Reading is part of the lehigh valley, part of southcentral pa and part of southeast pa and metro philadelphia. And our location identity has paid off. As a regional partner with southeast pa, we leveraged over $65,000 in commonwealth funds to support our local business outreach efforts. Managed the foreign trade zone 147 for berks county; coordinated prospect site visits with Economic development partners; identified key common issues our local companies are facing to develop strategies and programs to support them; provided marketing and outreach support for the development of new industrial sites and buildings so berks county will have expanded visibility for available location opportunities; participated with several regional and national Economic development organizations including; industrial asset management council, international Economic development council, Pennsylvania Economic development association, site selector guild, and the world trade center of harrisburg; and met routinely with local legislators, state officials, community, and business leaders to provide updates about Economic development in berks county.grep, as the lead marketing organization for business attraction for berks county, continued an aggressive marketing and public relations campaign throughout 2018. Some of grep's major accomplishments included: created original content on greaterreading.org and deployed through various digital platforms; developed a marketing strategy for talent attraction and retention for berks county; created high-quality and customizable collateral materials and prospect information; attended 7 industry tradeshows and conferences to promote Greater Reading to highly targeted audiences.