idX Brings Business To Columbia

Earlier Wednesday, Wordbones reported on the idX move in Snowden from Odenton. After reading this, I got on the horn to Frank Grelle, the general manager of idX's Baltimore division to get the scoop.

idX manufactures shelves, tables and other store fixtures for Kohl's, JC Penney's, Marshalls and other retailers as well as financial institutions. Based in St. Louis, Mo, idX has offices in Louisville, Seattle, Toronto and Shanghai. The company bought out Russell Williams Ltd in 2005 which was originally based in Columbia but moved to Odenton.

idX in Odenton currently operates out of two buildings catty corner to each other. Grelle describes the move into the Snowden building as more efficient for the operation.

"As we continue to grow, I really needed to be in one building so that I don't have to move finished from the manufacturing building, onto a trailer, move them 50 yards and unload them into a warehouse."

idX is moving it's operation to 8901 Snowden River parkway because the new location has many more dock doors than their Odenton location. The additional space of the Snowden location will also allow Grelle to house all of his production lines under one roof and make the distribution process easier.

“We might ship to 15 Kohl's stores in a matter of three days, so when you've got limited dock doors, you can't stage in advance because you can't block a dock door. In the new building we can say this is store A, this is store B, this is store C, this is store D and we can stage the product that goes on to the truck that's going to that store in advance.”

So will the move into Columbia bolster the local economy and create more jobs? Grelle says yes, but not right away.

“The move probably by itself probably isn't going to create more jobs, you know, other than the jobs created due to tenant improvements to this facility, but by gaining these efficiencies in planning for the future, that's going to help us gain more business which will in turn create jobs.”

Grelle says the company hopes to complete the move into Columbia by July of this year.