The Navy Federal Credit Union came to the Pensacola Bay Area of Florida three years ago because of the region’s high-quality work force and an ideal site location.

It was a successful site location decision — so successful that the Vienna, Va.,-based organization announced last year that it will expand its operations in Escambia County.

Navy Federal has operated a 56,000 square foot customer service center in the 50-acre Heritage Oaks Commerce Park since January 2004. It currently has a work force of more than 400 employees.

The Escambia County site is the credit union’s first customer service center outside its headquarters complex.

Expansion plans call for the construction of an additional 100,000 square foot building, generating 650 new employees during the next several years. Positions will range from entry-level to professional, with salaries starting from $10 an hour to $35,000 annually.

In addition to the customer service center, the expansion will allow for new programs, such as mortgage processing and credit card services. Navy Federal has leased a former supermarket site in Cantonment for hiring and training, and a former drug store will be opened for mortgage processing.

“When we initially started operations here, little did we know we were going to outgrow the space we had so quickly,” said Cutler Dawson, president and CEO of Navy Federal.

Navy Federal, founded in 1933, serves the U.S. Department of Navy, military and civilian personnel, and contractors. It is one example of the eclectic base of companies that locate facilities in the state of Florida.

Service Sector Jobs in Abundance

More than one-third of all jobs created in the United States during the past five years have been created in Florida, according to Tax Watch Center for a Competitive Florida. Of the 2 million non-agricultural jobs created in the five-year period ending in October 2005, Florida added 688,600, or 34 percent, of the total in the nation.

Eight-eight percent of people working in Florida work in the services industry, an industry that continues to grow throughout the state.

A company that originates and consolidates college loans will receive up to $750,000 in state tax incentives during the next three years after agreeing to stay and expand its headquarters in the Tampa metro area.

Academic Financial Services (AFS), which has been in business for two years and employs about 330 workers in Tampa, will build a new headquarters facility.

The company writes about $70 million each month in federally guaranteed educational loans, said Wayne Morgan, president and CEO of AFS. About half of AFS’ business is college loan consolidation. The company also handles a small percentage of private educational loans.

AFS did consider moving its headquarters out of Florida. Texas and North Carolina made the short list of possibilities.

Incentives were only one reason for the decision to remain in Tampa, Morgan said.

“The incentives in North Carolina were better,” he pointed out. “But the fact that we have phenomenal employees here who we might not be able to take with us won us over.”

Morgan said he is considering several different sites for the new 120,000 square foot facility, all in the area surrounding the University of South Florida. The company expects to invest more than $19 million in construction and equipment for the new campus.

In return for incentives under Florida’s Qualified Target Industry (QTI) Tax Refund program, AFS has agreed to add 250 employees during the next three years at an average annual pay of $45,000. The company must also maintain those jobs for five years.

The company will be adding development and marketing jobs, Morgan said, as it expands its business and brings services like loan processing in-house.

Services industry jobs are also growing in the Jacksonville metro area, where Fidelity National Financial and Washington Mutual are making expansion plans.

Fidelity National Financial, which relocated its corporate headquarters from Santa Barbara, Calif., to Jacksonville three years ago, announced plans to add an additional 800 jobs in the metro.

Fidelity National Information Services, the company’s information technology unit, will add 600 jobs and Fidelity National Financial corporate will add 200 jobs. The announcements represent a capital investment of more than $60 million and jobs with an average salary of more than $50,000.

Washington Mutual recently received approval for incentives from the Jacksonville City Council and the state, and it will begin plans to locate an East Coast regional operations center in the metro.

Manufacturer Puts Plant, HQ in Tallahassee

Citing a need to expand to meet rapidly growing customer demands, Danfoss Turbocor Compressors Inc., an HVAC manufacturer of oil-free centrifugal compressors, will relocate its headquarters and manufacturing plant to Tallahassee from Montreal. The company expects to be in its new 65,000 square foot facility by June.

Tallahassee’s large, highly educated work force, and its proximity to two seaports were key aspects of the site location decision.

Relocating plant operations to Florida is part of a global strategy to place manufacturing facilities in the markets served by Danfoss Turbocor, as well as to position operations to take advantage of high-tech resources, said Joe Orosz, president of the company.

The Tallahassee plant’s annual production capacity potential of more than 10,000 compressors — a production goal the company will exceed during the next several years — will allow Danfoss Turbocor to meet rapidly growing production demands, he pointed out.

“We needed a location that could support growth in a high-tech product, both from development and manufacturing perspectives,” Orosz said. “In turn, we offered the advantage of being a major high-tech, non-polluting employer that will contribute many high-tech jobs. We are excited about this move and the potential it offers to both our company and our customers.”