Prospect of natural products prize enough to get cities talking tofu

Wouldn˜t you know it. Just when Boulder decides economy vitality might be a good thing after all, along comes a company saying it needs 150,000 to perhaps even 200,000 square feet.

Oops. Now what?

And this isn˜t a big bad smoke-stack business that would have every resident in the city up in protest.

No, this is a combination of entrepreneurial companies born and bred here in Boulder County. It˜s perhaps the most classic case of successful entrepreneurs needing room to grow the city˜s seen for some time.

It˜s a combination of a homegrown tofu maker who started out wheeling around some rather odd vegetarian food in a bucket to anyone willing to give it a try as well as a bunch of guys who figured they could convince consumers that cows not fattened up on a bunch of antibiotics and hormones might actually produce a safer and better-tasting milk.

Just so happens the largest dairy producer in the country, Dean Foods, agreed there really might be something to this organic business after all, and made entrepreneur Steve Demos of White Wave as well as the founders of Horizon Organic some very rich people by buying both of their companies.

By combining those two firms with its Dean National Brand Group, Dallas-based Dean says it would like a corporate headquarters for about 500 employees somewhere in the Boulder area. The company will be doing about a billion in annual sales, with expected annual growth of 20 percent.

This is the kind of business announcement that gets real estate brokers dialing for dollars as quick as their fingers can move. And since Steve Demos is the new president of the yet-unnamed Dean Foods subsidiary, his phone has been particularly busy.

Word so far is the Dean company has not decided to work with a single broker. "Bring us a deal, and we˜ll take a look" seems to be the modus operandi.

Right in the thick of things is Mike Stumpf, the city˜s fresh-on-the-job economic vitality coordinator. And what Mike no doubt has realized by now is the city of Boulder itself has not a single vacant site that can meet these space requirements.

The former site of Exabyte on Araphoe, its new owners have said, might be redeveloped into residential. Broker sources say it might be possible to pull a few contiguous buildings together in Gunbarrel, but even that might be a stretch.

Some Boulder buildings, however, do come close, Andrew Freeman of Freeman Property Advisors showed me from his database. A site on 38th Street has 98,000 available; there is 122,730 square feet on Exposition; 120,288 is listed for an amazing $7 a square foot on Flatiron Parkway and another 80,712 square feet is open on Lookout Road.

That said, very quickly when you talk to brokers the names of Broomfield, Longmont and even "OuterLocken" by Jeffco Airport come into play.

What has to be whetting Boulder officials˜ appetites is just the idea of landing another natural foods leader, like they did with Wild Oats˜ new headquarters and store at the Twenty Ninth Street retail center. It˜s enough to make them gobble two or three all-grain, organic veggie burgers down in a few gulps.

Now for the record, Horizon Organic grew up near Niwot. And Broomfield˜s Interlocken has Gaiam Inc., which sells environmental friendly products and has helped define the LOHAS (lifestyles of health and sustainability) industry. So Boulder does not have a lock on the natural products scene.

But Celestial Seasonings and founder Mo Siegel helped get the organic Boulder brand going, and now the city claims all-natural potato chips, Rudi˜s organic breads, environmentally friendly building products companies like Eco-Products and even the new, hip IZZE all-natural sparkling fruit drinks.

Boulder˜s Stumpf says the city might have to "be creative" to find a new home for the Dean group. And you can bet there˜s some warm feelings in Demos˜ heart for keeping a Boulder address. But he˜s admitted the company might have to settle for being "near" Boulder.

After all, this new Dean group also is responsible for the product lines of International Delight coffee creamers, Land O˜Lakes dairy products as well as — and this will make the raw fooders cringe — Hershey˜s milks and shakes and Marie˜s and Dean˜s dips and dressings.

Do you think the White Wave tofu employees will sneak over to the side of the building when they˜re taste-testing the new Hershey˜s shake? Can you get away with a big Frito chip full of dip washed down with an all-natural Horizon orange juice?

Maybe the idea of a few separate buildings under one name isn˜t so bad after all?

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