Crown's office in Charlotte, North Carolina

Crown Equipment Corp is moving its factory-direct sales and service branch from Charlotte, North Carolina to Concord, North Carolina.

Crown bought the 44,800 square foot (4,408 square metre) Oakmont Speculative Building on eight acres at 8401 Westmoreland Drive, near the Concord Regional Airport.

Crown is expected to invest USD550,000 and bring 52 jobs to the new office.

Concord city is offering industrial grants to Crown, providing up to 85% of the additional tax revenue generated by the project for three years.

Concord mayor Scott Padgett says he is looking forward to working with Crown.

"This is another example of why we need to have industrial land and speculative buildings in place. There are companies seeking these ready-to-go sites and we need to have an inventory of options available for opportunities such as this," he says.

The Charlotte Observer reports Crown will move from its current Charlotte office to Concord in the first quarter of 2008.

Warren Snowdon of commercial real estate company Commercial Carolina, helped Crown search for and buy the property.