A printing company with a nearly century-long history in the Baltimore area is leaving the city, a move that potentially puts 144 people out of work.
BC Graphics, which produces direct mail, is not renewing its lease on a South Baltimore industrial site and will shift its operations to facilities in Western Maryland, Virginia and Kansas, according to a company spokesperson. Edge Direct, a sister company based at the same facility, is also leaving Baltimore.
Both are owned by Moore, a Lanham-based company. It’s unclear how many total jobs are affected by the decision to shutter the facility in Cherry Hill.
This week BC Graphics notified the Maryland Department of Labor that it will close its plant by Nov. 15 and lay off as many as 144 people. The spokesperson, who declined to give their name, said Edge Direct is relocating to Lanham in Prince George’s County.
The facility in Cherry Hill no longer meets the company’s needs, the spokesperson said, and Moore’s other locations are larger and more technologically advanced. BC Graphics broke the news to employees in May, the spokesperson said.
BC Graphics has gone through multiple iterations since its founding in 1928. According to archival news reports, the company once specialized in lithography and greeting cards. Before BC Graphics, it was known as Barton-Cotton Inc.
Larry Vogel, 68, a longtime executive who ran BC Graphics before a planned retirement earlier this year, declined to comment on news of the closure, but said the Cherry Hill printing facility could process 200 million pieces of mail a year.
“The Moore organization has done a lot to provide opportunities for existing employees in multiple locations,” Vogel said.
The company had been family-owned until 2006 when it was purchased by American Capital Strategies, Vogel said. Three years later, BC Graphics declared bankruptcy and was facing liquidation, court records show.
Vogel helped steer the company through that process and find a buyer — Moore. Instead of closing the business, it moved from Arbutus in Baltimore County to its current location in Cherry Hill and continued to operate for another 14 years.
Now, four years shy of the century mark, it’s closing.
It’s a common tale for the region, said Mac McComas, the senior program director of the Johns Hopkins 21st Century Cities Initiative. Both Baltimore and Baltimore County have been losing manufacturing jobs for decades. As warehouses and factories in urban areas age, companies are likely to move to rural areas or smaller cities where land is cheaper.
McComas said he had never heard of BC Graphics, and the company has made few — if any — headlines in recent years. Still, it’s these small and mid-sized companies tucked away in industrial areas that can be some of the biggest and most stable employers in a region, he said.
The company’s facility in Cherry Hill is one of several industrial companies clustered around Interstate 95 in South Baltimore, including Marlin Steel, a steel wire fabrication company.
Marlin CEO Drew Greenblatt said he didn’t know why BC Graphics was closing, but he was “heartbroken” the city is losing more blue-collar jobs.
Marlin Steel employs 40 people in Baltimore, is looking to hire 10 more people, and has no desire to leave, Greenblatt said.
In recent years, however, Marlin has expanded outside of Maryland, adding facilities in Michigan and Indiana, he said. Both states offered grants that allowed Marlin to invest in high-tech and expensive machinery.
Moore, the parent company of BC Graphics, recently made a similar decision.
The company issued a press release last week touting a $31 million investment to expand its direct mail business in Topeka, Kansas, that it said would create 60 jobs. An economic development organization in Topeka pledged $272,000 in grants for the expansion, the press release said.
That’s what Maryland needs to be doing, said Greenblatt.
“The ripple effects are massive and negative if factories close and move away,” he said. “We lose the middle class.”
