The new building will have workspace for up to 60 employees. (Cherise Letson/Huddle)
The Cooke family was determined to save the synagogue building in the city centre and they’ve been rewarded for their efforts with the 2019 Developers Award, an honour Cooke Aquaculture will receive at the Saint John Region Chamber of Commerce Outstanding Business Awards on October 10.
“The Cooke family felt very strongly when they heard that the former synagogue was slated to be torn down,” said Joel Richardson, Vice President of Public Relations, in an interview Thursday. “They made a decision as a family to save the building and make a very significant investment to renovate, restore and modernize the building and turn it into offices for our growing workforce here in uptown Saint John.”
The global seafood company is being recognized for renovating the former synagogue on Carleton Street and Wellington Row into a corporate workspace for up to 60 employees.
Cooke’s global headquarters are currently across the street from the re-purposed synagogue building, making the building’s purchase and renovations in 2018 a natural decision for the company.
RELATED: Cooke Aquaculture Purchasing Old Saint John Synagogue Building
The building is 148 years old and was constructed in 1871 by the Calvin Presbyterian Church. It was purchased by the Saint John Jewish community in 1919 and renovated from a Christian Church to a synagogue. It was declared a Provincial Historic Site in 2006, decommissioned and sold to the City of Saint John in 2008, then declared surplus in 2017.
“We’re a New Brunswick family-owned company and Cooke felt very strongly that they didn’t want to see the synagogue be torn down and lose a provincial, a designated historic site,” says Richardson.
A selection committee of City of Saint John and Develop Saint John representatives chose the development project based on its merits in urban and architectural design, benefits to the community, innovation and problem solving, commercial success and acting as a catalyst for future business and community development.
“We are here to grow the tax base by helping organizations, developers and investors imagine the art of the possible, elevating development projects from good to great,” said Steve Carson, CEO of Development Saint John, in a release. “Cooke Aquaculture saw the potential of this provincial historic site and its central location to reimagine how it could be at the centre of a new vision – creating an innovative campus-like setting to attract and retain today’s top talent.”
RELATED: Take A Look Inside Cooke’s New Office In An Old Synagogue
Saint John’s proximity to key Cooke markets, such as the U.S. Eastern seaboard where the company supplies much of their salmon and seafood products, led the company to recruit people from around the world to come work and live in Saint John and its surrounding communities.
Richardson expressed that one of the company’s top priorities is to put people into the former synagogue building and fill the offices.
“The furniture and final touches have just been completed in the synagogue, so we expect we’re going to be moving people in there soon and we’ve been doing recruiting and hiring to fill positions,” he said.
The 2019 Developer Award will be presented at the Saint John Region Chamber’s 35th annual Outstanding Business Awards October 10 at the Saint John Trade & Convention Centre.
A version of this story was published in Huddle, an online business news publication based in Saint John. Huddle is an Acadia Broadcasting content partner.
