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byline: Kate Andrews

Boeing plans global HQ move to Arlington

Boeing Co., the world’s third-largest defense contractor, is planning to move its global headquarters from Chicago to Arlington, the company announced Thursday.

The aerospace and defense company, which employs more than 141,500 people worldwide, has operations in more than 65 countries and will be the largest defense contractor headquartered in Virginia. Falls Church-based Northrop Grumman Corp. and Reston-based General Dynamics Corp. rank fourth and fifth respectively among the world’s largest defense contractors.

Boeing already has a 4.7-acre campus in Arlington’s Crystal City area, which is near Amazon.com Inc.’s HQ2 campus in National Landing, and the company said it has decided to develop a research and technology hub there as it moves its global corporate headquarters to the region. Boeing did not release a time frame for the relocation.

“We also want to especially thank Gov. [Glenn] Youngkin for his partnership, and [U.S.] Sen. [Mark] Warner for his support as we worked through the process,” Boeing President and CEO Dave Calhoun said in a statement. Earlier Thursday, The Wall Street Journal reported the prospective move, noting that Youngkin has been in talks with the company for months. In 2017, Boeing announced it would move its defense unit’s headquarters from St. Louis to Arlington to be closer to the federal government and Pentagon officials.

“Boeing is one of America’s great pioneering businesses, and we are thrilled the company has decided to headquarter in Virginia,” Youngkin said in a statement. “The decision to call Virginia home shows that the commonwealth is the premier location for aerospace companies. I look forward to working with Boeing to attract even more talent to Virginia, especially given its reputation for engineering excellence.”

Boeing announced that its commercial airplane business unit will remain in Seattle, and Boeing Global Services will stay in Plano, Texas, in the Dallas suburbs.

“We are excited to build on our foundation here in Northern Virginia,” Calhoun said. “The region makes strategic sense for our global headquarters given its proximity to our customers and stakeholders, and its access to world-class engineering and technical talent.”

Warner’s office released a statement from the senior Democratic senator: “For well over a year, I’ve been making my case to Boeing senior leadership that Virginia would be a great place for its headquarters, and late last year, I was happy to learn that my efforts were successful. As the former governor of Virginia, I was proud to secure Virginia’s standing as the best state for business and the best-managed state, among other honors, and I’ve been proud to work in my role as senator to help continue to cultivate the kind of pro-business environment that world-class companies like Boeing need to grow and thrive.”

Boeing last year made a record $50 million donation to the Virginia Tech Innovation Campus to foster diversity at the graduate technology campus in Alexandria. Calhoun, a Virginia Tech alumnus, said at the time that the university “has a bold and unique vision to unlock the power of diversity to solve the world’s most pressing problems through technology…. Boeing is dedicated to advancing equity and inclusion both within our company and in our communities.”

“Boeing has been a leader in innovation and corporate citizenship in Arlington through its investments in tech talent and the overall community, making Arlington County an excellent place to live and work,” said Telly Tucker, director of Arlington Economic Development. “We are honored to work alongside Boeing and look forward to that continuing partnership as the home for its global headquarters.”

“We are thrilled to welcome Boeing’s corporate headquarters to Virginia, America’s corporate hometown,” Virginia Economic Development Partnership President and CEO Jason El Koubi said Thursday. “Boeing and other high-caliber firms are attracted to the commonwealth’s combination of diverse, world-class engineering and tech talent, strategic location and exceptional quality of life. Boeing’s new research and technology hub will further strengthen Virginia’s innovation ecosystem in areas like cybersecurity, autonomous operations, quantum sciences and software and systems engineering. We look forward to a continued partnership with Boeing as we begin this exciting new chapter.”

U.Va. hits $4B in capital campaign

The University of Virginia has hit its $4 billion benchmark in its $5 billion Honor the Future capital campaign three years ahead of its deadline, the university announced this week.

U.Va. has brought in significant individual donations during the fundraising campaign, including a record-breaking $120 million gift from alumni Jaffray and Merrill Woodriff in 2019, which is going toward the new School of Data Science, as well as major donations benefiting the U.Va. Medical Center, the McIntire School of Commerce, a new performing arts center and establishment of the Karsh Institute of Democracy.

Honor the Future was launched publicly in 2019, and the university has set a goal of raising $5 billion by 2025. One area in which it has already impacted students and faculty is the matching program to create endowed scholarships and professorships. U.Va. has generated $990 million in gifts and matching funds, assisting nearly 480 undergraduate and graduate students, as well as creating 120 endowed professorships. Princeton Review named U.Va. as the nation’s top public university for financial aid in 2022, for the second year in a row.

“I am deeply grateful for the generosity of our alumni, parents and friends,” President Jim Ryan said in a statement. “Their gifts of all sizes are inspirational — they show a confidence in U.Va.’s current and future opportunities to improve lives, not just in our community, but around the world.”

South Hill grant aims to boost business district

South Hill merchants figured out ways to keep business going during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, introducing Facebook Live videos from downtown stores that helped people shop from home, then pick up their treasures curbside.

Sometimes featuring a rescue dog named Duncan, the videos have continued even as restrictions are rolled back. Now, the town in Mecklenburg County has received extra help from a $50,000 “Welcome Back to Business” grant the South Hill Chamber of Commerce received in October 2021 from the Virginia Department of Housing and Community Development.

With the grant, the chamber is supporting 30 local businesses with façade improvements, mentoring and technical assistance to help owners navigate digital platforms.

“We have a wealth of talent and possibilities in South Hill, and we can help maximize that wealth to benefit businesses and ultimately the community at large,” says Shannon Lambert, the chamber’s executive director. “If people feel welcomed in the community, they’re going to stay in the community and keep their shopping dollars in the community.”

Mary Edmonds, owner of New 2 You Consignment Boutique, had new windows put in with the grant, as well as a new awning and sign that swings over her door. “I designed it — the top of it is a clothes hanger,” she says. “I’ve gotten more businesses complimenting me on that.”

Edmonds says that now that people are returning to town, some new businesses are emerging, including a brewery and a Starbucks. She and other business owners who belong to The Shops of South Hill group have begun telling customers about what other businesses are up to, in hopes of keeping people in town longer.

In short, “stay in town and shop around,” Edmonds says. “By doing that, you’re building a rapport. On Saturdays, we have a lot of out-of-town people.”

That sort of camaraderie is not unexpected in a town that rallied around small businesses during the worst days of the pandemic. Amid widespread shutdowns when people were reluctant to leave home, the South Hill chamber helped start up a temporary delivery service, staffed by volunteers, in order to keep local restaurants and small businesses operating.

“A lot of business owners grew up here,” says Mayor Dean Marion. “To be able to stay here, they have to create ways to attract people to our town and support businesses.”

Civica to produce lower-cost insulin

Civica Rx, a nonprofit generic drug-maker with a pharmaceutical manufacturing plant under construction in Petersburg, plans to produce three forms of insulin priced at $30 per vial beginning in early 2024, a project that dovetails with a bill in Congress that would cap consumers’ out-of-pocket insulin costs.

Civica’s 140,000-square-foot, $124.5 million Petersburg production facility will become the Utah-based manufacturer’s North American headquarters when it opens in early 2024. Built to produce medicines for the treatment of COVID-19, the plant also will include space for insulin manufacturing, company representatives said during an April tour. Civica plans to hire up to 250 people for the factory, up from its original plan to hire 186 workers.

“We’ve had a bunch of large donors who are very concerned about diabetes and the cost of insulin come to us and ask us to [manufacture] insulin,” says Civica President and CEO Martin VanTrieste. The $30 insulin vials will cost “about 90% [less] than today’s list price,” he says. “And,” he adds, “as you know, the list price is a price no one pays unless you have no insurance.”

In April, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill to cap insulin prices at $35 a month or 25% of an insurance plan’s negotiated price, whichever is lower. According to the Health Care Cost Institute, insulin prices doubled between 2012 and 2016.

In Petersburg, Civica is partnering with Richmond-based Phlow Corp. and Rancho Cordova, California-based AMPAC Fine Chemicals to produce COVID drugs as part of a federal initiative to create a domestic supply chain for critical pharmaceuticals and ingredients. U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine visited the Civica plant, which is halfway completed, in April, participating in a roundtable discussion about drug costs and workforce training initiatives at the region’s universities and colleges.

Kaine supports the $35 out-of-pocket cap on insulin costs and hopes to revive a previous bill he introduced to allow students to use Pell Grant funds to pay for short-term certificate programs in pharmaceutical manufacturing and other vocational studies.

Aside from lowering consumer costs, Kaine says, producing medications domestically will help lighten the nation’s dependence on Chinese drug manufacturers.

“I think most of us feel better about the quality when it’s made here at home,” he says. “You don’t have to assume that China’s a bad actor, [but] in the next pandemic, they are naturally going to prioritize producing pharmaceuticals for their own population.” 

Carilion Clinic receives $1M gift for education program

An anonymous couple has given Carilion Clinic a $1 million gift to support its employee career advancement program, the Roanoke health system announced Thursday.

The Your Efforts, Supported program (YES) will launch later this year, with a goal to assist entry-level health care employees to earn certifications and further their education to meet career goals. The gift — which will benefit Black employees enrolled in the program — will help Carilion pay to workers’ enrollment fees in degree, credential or certificate programs, as well as associated costs and their regular wages and benefits while they are in school. The YES program is open to entry-level employees of any race or ethnicity.

“This gift makes a profound statement about the value of education and its potential to transform lives through new opportunities while meeting urgent staffing needs,” President and CEO Nancy Howell Agee said in a statement. “We’re grateful to these donors who came forward at just the right time.”

The gift will set up the John Cooker Endowment Fund, in honor of a Black man who was enslaved by the donor’s grandfather’s family and continued to work for them after emancipation. According to the donor, his grandfather as a young boy called the man “John Cooker.”

“Although John Cooker has long since passed, his memory will live on through other African Americans who’ll have the opportunity to achieve the dreams John was never able to realize,” the donor said. “It’s the key reason why we will remain anonymous, and John will not. Our hope is that this gift will inspire others to help hard-working employees improve their lives through education.”

FDA moves toward menthol cigarettes ban

The Food and Drug Administration said Thursday that it plans to ban sales of menthol cigarettes, a billion-dollar industry in which Philip Morris USA has a 9.4% market share.

Philip Morris USA, a subsidiary of Henrico County-based Altria Group Inc., manufactures Marlboro menthol cigarettes among its other brands, but R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.’s Newport cigarettes are the top-selling menthol brand in the United States. The ban, which was widely anticipated after the FDA announced its intentions in spring 2021, would affect only traditional menthol cigarettes, not heated tobacco products like Altria’s IQOS and Marlboro HeatSticks. Those products, however, were pulled from the U.S. market in November 2021 after the federal International Trade Commission (ITC) ruled that the products violated patents held by rival Reynolds.

“We believe harm reduction, not prohibition, is the better path forward,” Altria Group spokesman Steven Callahan said in a statement Thursday. “Taking these products out of the legal marketplace will push them into unregulated, criminal markets that don’t follow any regulations and ignore minimum age laws. We will continue to engage in this long-term regulatory process.”

Proponents of the ban, however, contend that the menthol ban could reduce the number of Black and younger smokers who are more likely to purchase mint-flavored cigarettes.

“The proposed rules would help prevent children from becoming the next generation of smokers and help adult smokers quit,” U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a statement. “Additionally, the proposed rules represent an important step to advance health equity by significantly reducing tobacco-related health disparities.”

According to the FDA, there were more than 18.5 million U.S. menthol smokers ages 12 and older in 2019, and studies have suggested that the nation could see a 15% reduction in smoking within 40 years if menthol cigarettes were banned, as well as a reduction of 324,000 to 654,000 deaths attributed to smoking over that time.

Altria also reported its 2022 first-quarter earnings Thursday, recording net revenue of $5.89 billion since Jan. 1, a decrease of 2.4% compared with the first quarter of 2021. The report says that supply chain disruptions and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have contributed to higher energy prices, changes in consumer behavior and overall inflation.

Martin Agency’s Robinson wins Ad Age CCO of the year

Danny Robinson, The Martin Agency’s chief creative officer, was named Ad Age’s chief creative officer of the year on Thursday, as the publication lauded him for having “revved up the agency’s creative output, turning out great ideas at a quicker pace across multiple categories and brands.”

Among Richmond-based Martin’s clients are Geico, UPS, Old Navy, Doordash and Axe, and Ad Age noted the agency’s move into the world of products with the debut of “Scoop There It Is” ice cream, which was developed after the popular Geico ads featuring rappers Tag Team performing “Whoop! There It Is!”

Robinson, who became CCO in 2020, was previously Martin’s chief client officer. He also is a former copywriter who founded New York-based agency Vigilante (which orchestrated Oprah Winfrey’s famous car giveaway show), and he joined Martin in 2004 as part of the agency’s winning bid for Walmart’s account. He is Martin’s first Black CCO and remains one of the few at a non-Black-owned agency, Ad Age notes. He has restructured the creative department and diversified its workforce, with 55% of all creative staffers hired in 2021 being women or Black, Indigenous or other people of color.

“There’s an eclecticism to Danny’s journey,” jury chair Chaka Sobhani, global chief creative officer of Leo Burnett, told Ad Age. “Hope comes from the fact that you don’t have to come from certain universities, a certain background. Danny had all these different roles, and then ultimately found his place.”

In December 2021, Martin was named Adweek’s U.S. agency of the year for the second consecutive year.

Virginia Business wins 11 state press awards

Virginia Business has won 11 awards in the Virginia Press Association’s 2021 News & Advertising Contest, the state organization announced this week. The annual contest recognizes excellence in design, writing, photography, illustrations and advertising in participating publications across Virginia for the previous calendar year. Judges for this year’s contest are from Pennsylvania’s press association.

The magazine won three first-place awards in the following categories:

  • Digital Advertising — Art Director Joel Smith’s digital ad for the Virginia CFO Awards was praised by judges for “use of color, emphasis on event date and time.”
  • Professional Services advertising — Smith and Account Manager Toni McCracken won for an ad for Glenn Industrial.
  • Special Sections or Special Editions — Editor Richard Foster, Smith and freelance designer Sarah Barton won for the 2021 edition of the Virginia 500, which judges said was “simply well done. From the cover through the capsules, there was a sense of a grand project. It was deep yet easy to navigate.”

The magazine also won six second-place awards, including:

Virginia Business also took third-place awards in the following categories:

  • Education, Churches and Organizations in advertising — Joel Smith and Account Manager Lindsey DiStanislao, for an ad for the Virginia Department of Veteran Services
  • Special Sections or Special Editions — Andrews, Foster and Smith for the 2021 Hampton Roads Business guide, which judges said was “very engaging from the cover on back.”

Virginia Business competed in the specialty publication category, which also includes the Washington Business Journal, Virginia Lawyers Weekly, Richmond magazine and Style Weekly.

Something in the Water officially heads to D.C.

Music superstar and Virginia Beach native Pharrell Williams announced Tuesday that his signature three-day music festival, Something in the Water, will be held in June in Washington, D.C., making its departure from Virginia Beach official.

Scheduled for June 17-19 on Independence Avenue, the three-day festival includes a long list of pop and hip-hop artists, including “Pharrell & phriends & some people we can’t announce.”

The festival was previously held on the Virginia Beach Oceanfront in April 2019, before the pandemic caused its cancellation in 2020 and 2021. In September 2021, however, Williams wrote a letter to the city manager saying that he would cancel the 2022 festival because of the city’s “toxic energy.” He said that the fallout from his cousin Donovon Lynch’s killing by a Virginia Beach police officer in March 2021 and a special grand jury’s finding of no probable cause to charge the officer, combined with other issues surrounding Williams’ economic development projects in the city, made him decide to call off the festival, which yielded $24 million in local economic impact in 2019.

However, in recent weeks, there were rumors of the festival moving to Washington, confirmed Tuesday via Williams’ social media platforms and the event’s website.

Barry Biggar, president and CEO of Visit Fairfax, said that his office is excited about SITW’s move, but the festival’s impact on surrounding Northern Virginia localities “depends on how full the hotels in D.C. are and how much they charge. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

In a January interview with Virginia Business, Williams said that he wanted to restage the festival elsewhere, noting, “Something in the Water — when you talk DMV, they always say, ‘Man, whether it’s Missy Elliott or Timbaland or Chad Hugo or Michael Vick, it must be something in the water.'”

Judge dismisses Trigiani lawsuit against New Peoples Bank

A federal judge issued a summary judgment last week, dismissing all claims in former executive Mary Y. Trigiani’s lawsuit against Russell County-based New Peoples Bank for discrimination and wrongful termination. Trigiani’s complaints of a “cultlike office culture” did not hold up to judicial scrutiny, U.S. District Judge James P. Jones ruled.

A Big Stone Gap native, sister of bestselling author Adriana Trigiani and former Virginia Bar Association president Pia Trigiani, Mary Trigiani was employed as New Peoples Bank’s senior vice president of strategic planning and development from 2017 to 2019. Trigiani founded a consulting practice, Spada Inc., in 1990 and has served on multiple advisory and nonprofit boards, including the GO Virginia Region One Technology Working Group. Before joining NPB full-time, she was a contracted consultant for the bank.

In January 2021, Trigiani sued New Peoples Bank in U.S. Western District Court of Virginia, claiming that she was discriminated against because of her Catholic, nonevangelical religious beliefs, her age and her gender. She characterized the bank’s culture as akin to a cult, claiming that NPB President and CEO C. Todd Asbury, who also serves as senior pastor of Adoration Church in Bristol, “encouraged a cultlike office culture by opposing individualistic thinking/ideas, penalizing or ostracizing employees who did not follow to the letter the certain cultural-religious tenets (such as the subjugation of women), expecting a slavish devotion to the NPB Cult, avoiding what he considered to be worldly/contemporary activities, and rewarding blind allegiance.”

However, on April 20, Jones ruled in favor of the defendants’ motion for summary judgment, writing, “While over-the-top allegations are unfortunately not unusual in initial pleadings, the time for reckoning often comes, as it does in this case. The plaintiff here is essentially her only witness and her subjective conclusions about her own conduct and the resulting treatment by her employer do not overcome the undisputed facts.”

“We are very pleased with the outcome of the lawsuit,” Asbury said in a statement. “It has been our position since the day it was filed that this lawsuit was frivolous and the claims were false, and it is great to see that justice has finally been served. It is unfortunate that the bank and its employees have had to endure this unnecessary disruption to serving our customers’ banking needs.”

Trigiani had argued that she was terminated “because she is a strong woman,” according to the ruling, “a ‘bold … loud-speaking, emphatic person and that does not jive with their definition of femininity,'” but the judge wrote that “no one complained … that Trigiani was a strong woman. Rather, she was accused of yelling and raising her voice, slamming her door, and belittling her colleagues and making them cry.” The judge noted that she “admitted that such conduct would be inappropriate in the workplace, regardless of gender,” and her claim that male executives acted similarly “lacks any evidentiary support.”

Also, her claims of religious discrimination did not hold up, the judge ruled, noting that several board members who approved her hiring and firing are also Catholic.

Thomas E. Strelka of Roanoke-based Strelka Employment Law, who represents Trigiani, said she is “currently weighing all options,” including a possible appeal. “Ms. Trigiani had strong claims, and we believe that her claims were struck in error. As alleged, she was treated in a discriminatory fashion.”

Trigiani had dropped earlier claims of alleged hostile work environment harassment and age discrimination, and Jones dismissed her remaining claims in the April 20 ruling. The bank, represented by O’Hagan Meyer, contended that Trigiani had been chosen for termination as part of a workforce reduction “because of her high salary and performance issues,” according to the judgment.

At least 10 employees complained about her behavior, saying that Trigiani often lost her temper, the judgment said, and Asbury met with Trigiani to discuss the complaints in December 2018 and had ordered another employee to draft a separation agreement. At the time of Trigiani’s June 2019 separation from the bank, 10 other staff positions were eliminated, nine of which were held by women, and in 2020, 30 more people were laid off, including four senior male executives, according to the judgment.

Jones wrote in the ruling that the bank met its burden to show that its workforce reduction was conducted to reduce headcount and debt, “and that it based its selection criteria on cost and job performance — both valid, nondiscriminatory bases.”

By the end of 2020, NPB had 189 employees, down from 371 employees in 2008, and the bank did not report positive earnings until 2021, the ruling said.