Wing Enterprises flies to Provo

PROVO — It sounds like a joke:

Why did the ladder company cross the road?

Well, it's not a joke — it's what's happening at Wing Enterprises, which is leaving its longtime Springville site for a spot at a nearby Provo business center.

Wing Enterprises Inc., a Springville-based ladder manufacturing company, has announced that it will become the first tenant in Provo's 300-acre expansion at the Mountain Vista Business Center on State Street.

The company's new digs, a 300,000-square-foot campus made up of three buildings, will replace the current facility, a 96,000 square-foot building that is almost directly across the street from the site where the new building will stand.

Hal Wing, the owner of Wing Enterprises and former Springville mayor, said he would have liked to stay in the city, but couldn't reach a financial agreement that would have convinced him to keep the plant there.

"We couldn't get Springville to concede anything," Wing said.

Wing said he asked City Administrator Layne Long for some slack on some city requirements. For example, he said, the city would not bend on landscaping codes around the proposed new building. Also, he said, the city wouldn't sell or lease land they own near the new plant that Wing wanted to use for parking.

Long said he tried to keep the company in Springville — its home for 32 years — but couldn't find a way.

"From Springville's perspective, we absolutely would have loved to have them continue to be part of our industrial park," Long said in a phone message left with the Deseret Morning News.

"We explored several different options, different properties and such that may have worked with this company, but for whatever business reasons, they decided to go to Provo."

Wing said those business reasons included a much lower rate on utilities and a deferred payment plan for the land.

Leland Gamette, Provo's economic development director, said setting up shop in Provo will save Wing Enterprises about 50 percent on its power rates because Provo has lower rates. The company will also have 10 years — interest free — to pay the $2.4 million purchase price for the land.

"This is a very dynamic, growing business," Gamette said. "It's a business we wanted to keep in Utah Valley and in the Utah economy."