THE Big Island's civil defense director, Harry Kim, veteran of dozens of natural disasters, has pronounced the new C. Brewer and Co. corporate headquarters a pretty safe place to be. C. Brewer’s
new Big Island
headquartersThis beautiful structure on a promontory just north of Hilo is unlikely to be destroyed by either earthquakes, tsunamis or hurricanes, Kim told Brewer's CEO, J.W.A. "Doc" Buyers, who picked the old Hilo Sugar warehouse site in 1996 when he wanted to relocate his corporate headquarters closer to the scene of most of Brewer's operations.
The Brewer move, completed last March, was more than an ordinary headquarters shift since Brewer, founded in 1826, is the oldest of the Big Five companies that dominated Hawaii until recent decades and is the first to headquarter on a neighbor island.
Buyers may be Hawaii's Salesman of the Year for any year. He bubbles with enthusiasm, typically displayed while showing how -- from behind sliding doors of matched koa from nearby C. Brewer lands -- he can produce high-tech presentations and communication to match anything in a New York City corporate headquarters.
The graceful, open, modern new structure -- called Wainaku Executive Center -- has earned historic preservation tax credits for building on the footprint of a 1923 sugar warehouse. Pictures show it in a very dilapidated condition as Buyers spotted it. It was a feat of imagination to visualize its $3.8 million transformation to today's showplace.
The old mill site at Wainaku is one of numerous sugar properties long owned by Brewer and now being converted to diversified agriculture.
Buyers loved its view of Hilo harbor, Hilo Bay and open ocean. His 40-inch office globe shows uninterrupted Pacific waters extending 2,000 miles north to Alaska. Ships and sometimes whales pass close by. Tsunamis pass by, too. History shows they don't build up their awful force until confined by the bay and harbor.
The design, built on the crack-free original 1923 concrete slab, is with green-tile roofs and a wide overhang protection from Hilo rains. Inside, modernism, air conditioning and high-tech wiring are softened with koa paneling and pictures from the sugar industry past. Products crafted by Big Island workers are highly touted by Buyers. Two outdoor amph-itheatres for community events overlook the ocean and bay. An old cane flume and concrete-walled sugar train tunnel have been saved.
Buyers now has condominium residences in both Honolulu and Hilo but has made the Big Island the target for Brewer's corporate giving. He has headed fund raising for Hospice of Hilo, the athletic program at the University of Hawaii-Hilo and a food drive .
Since he is 70, I asked if the center, so very much his creation, will outlast his stewardship. Of course, he said -- this is where Brewer's very diverse businesses are centered and great growth lies ahead.
He ticked off balanced growth prospects for the Big Island using the acronym FASTER G, with F for its floral industry. A is for agriculture -- the new, fast-growing diversified variety. S is for science. T is for tourism, E for education as with UH-Hilo's expanding specialties, and R for research -- marine, volcanic, astronomy, agricultural and geology. The final G is for government with some chunks of it being moved to the Big Island from Oahu.
HEADLINES have gone recently to the financial troubles of Brewer Homes, a Maui-based public company now separate from its parent. The parent C. Brewer is not a public corporation. Results need not be published. It has done an eye-popping job, however, of paying down to less than $20 million the $145 million debt Buyers and a hui undertook to take control in 1986. Selling the Honolulu office site was one of the debt-trimming moves. Buyers notes that most operating assets were saved, including 60,000 acres of land on the Big Island and 20,000 more on Maui and Kauai. His great dreams for the future still include a Big Island spaceport.
A.A. Smyser is the contributing editor
and former editor of the the Star-Bulletin
His column runs Tuesday and Thursday.