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NuComm International


Gregg and Real Bergevin


Nu Comm Employees
NuComm International of Toronto, Canada's leader in outsourced contact center solutions, has opened its 14th and largest call center in Lafayette. The center, which began operating in September 2006, is NuComm's second in the U.S. and will employ as many as 1,000 workers by the end of 2007.

Clive Woodrow, Vice President of Client Services for NuComm, explained why they initially considered Lafayette. "We were going through an expansion phase in the U.S., and Lafayette came up on the radar screen from that perspective. It was a good size population base, not too large, and it's really one of those communities that we felt, after doing some initial looking, there were a lot of people we could employ."

But what sealed the deal, according to Woodrow, was the way state and local economic development authorities worked with NuComm and bent over backward to make them feel welcome. "We've done this 14 times now, and we always stop and take a look at the folks who help make a project like this come together. And throughout every part of the process, they had contacts and people there to help us."

Former Louisiana Economic Development Secretary Michael J. Olivier welcomed the center as proof of the economic opportunities that exist for businesses, and of the effectiveness of cooperation between LED and local economic development authorities. "This NuComm project was one that we would like to take and make a model for everyone in the state because of the fact that we had a circumstance where a community economic development group, the Lafayette Economic Development Authority (LEDA), came to the state and said, 'we have a prospect. We've been doing our work and we have an opportunity. And here's what we propose.' "

What was proposed by Gregg Gothreaux of LEDA and former Secretary Olivier was an incentives package that included $2 million from the state and the local community to help retrofit an existing facility at Lafayette's Northgate Mall. According to former Secretary Olivier, this was a win-win-win situation for NuComm, the City of Lafayette and Louisiana as a whole. "We're talking about bringing 1,000 jobs to shopping mall. And those 1,000 people are going to attract other businesses to that mall. So not only was it an opportunity to attract the kind of business we want to attract to our state. It was also an opportunity for Lafayette to revitalize an important shopping area on the north side of the city."

He added, "Anytime you have the ability to invest a million dollars, two million with the community and create a 1,000 jobs we'll take those deals everyday."

Echoing former Secretary Olivier's observation that the experience with NuComm has been nothing but positive, Woodrow said, "In the seven years we've been in business, this is the best experience we've had. I think other states and communities could learn a great deal from the way Lafayette and the State of Louisiana do business." As for LED, he added, "I'd highly recommend them."

According to former Secretary Olivier, NuComm isn't the only business impressed with the way Louisiana does business. "Today we are dealing with over 77 projects that have expressed an interest in our state and that have an offer on the table. We're talking 19,000 jobs and over $8.5 billion in capital investment," he said.