Oregon Public Broadcasting

It’s easy to see how federal stimulus money might rescue companies that repave highways or retrofit bridges. But what about companies that make light fixtures or door handles? How can they get a share of the stimulus pie?

As Kristian Foden-Vencil reports, one Oregon company is fine-tuning its business plan to help renovate hundreds of federal buildings.

The federal government has put aside about $4 billion in stimulus money to renovate old government buildings. It’s a sum that’s big enough to catch the attention of any company -- including Portland’s own Rejuvenation House Parts.

Anyone who’s renovated an old Portland home over the last few decades knows Rejuvenation. Its store is an old brick warehouse where you can pick up anything from a shiny new chandelier to a battered old tub.

Alysa Rose: “We started as a junk shop back in 1977 selling architectural salvage from all those architectural remodels of the 1970’s.”

Company president, Alysa Rose.

Alysa Rose: “At that time the owner and founder Jim Kelly realized there was demand for these beautiful light fixtures. And he couldn’t meet that demand with the old stuff so he figured out how to manufacture reproductions. And that’s what we’ve been doing ever since.”

The various parts of the light fixtures are made overseas. But then they’re shipped to Oregon and put together in a small factory in Northwest Portland.

Rose starts the grand tour on a balcony overseeing the floor.

Alysa Rose: “This is just a nice vantage point. We moved into this building in the late 1990’s it’s about 80,000 square feet and … we basically restored the building and operate our manufacturing out of here.”

Kristian: “And you’ve got rows of people working on benches doing the lights. And then a storage area over there. And what paint in here? Is that the faint smell of paint?”

Alysa Rose: “That’s probably the finishes that you’re smelling....”

Despite the dwindling number of manufacturing jobs in the U.S., dozens of people here are earning about $13-an-hour to paint light fixtures, put them together and pack them for shipping.

Jessica Cossa has worked here about seven months.

Jessica Cossa: “Right now we’re in C-parts, which is where we pick up the components for an overall fixture to be put together. It’s pretty good. I’m not going to lie, you’re doing the same thing over and over again. But the people who do it are highly proficient in what they’re going and so that makes all the difference.”

During the real estate boom, Rejuvenation did well as people across the country spruced up their homes with period light fixtures. Then:

Alysa Rose: “About two years ago we began to see a softening in our business, when the housing market began to tank and then last fall and into this year we certainly have seen the impacts of the overall recession and consumer confidence.”

Business was down 10 percent last year and is tracking at 20 percent less this year.

In February, Rose and founder Jim Kelly had to lay off 25 people out of a staff of about 180. 

Alysa Rose: “We were just so touched and really humbled by people’s responses.  People who were losing their jobs, they felt bad for me and Jim.”

At about the same time Rejuvenation was making those cuts, the Eisenhower Building in Washington D.C. was under renovation. It’s an 18th century granite edifice, next to the White House. Remodelers used several of the company’s $7,000 light fixtures.

Rose says  that's when the light went on over her head.

Alysa Rose: “We have never really overtly marketed to the government. We have always kind of waited for them to find us. So now there’s a huge opportunity for us to be less bashful in going after that business.”

The federal government plans to spend about $4 billion for energy efficient retrofits. Rejuvenation is well positioned to grab some of that, and has asked a staff member to get to know the right people and find out which buildings need period fixtures as they're spruced up.