Advanstar shutting Eugene office.

Byline: Sherri Buri McDonald The Register-Guard

Downtown Eugene will suffer another hit when Advanstar Communications Inc. closes its office on Willamette Street, eliminating about 50 jobs.

Advanstar, a Boston-based trade publishing and marketing firm, said Wednesday that it will shut the Eugene office by the end of the year and transfer its work to other Advanstar locations.

"It was a business decision - a difficult one," said Michelle Mitchell, an Advanstar spokeswoman.

Advanstar will ask 11 Eugene employees if they want stay on staff and work from home; the remaining 39 employees will be eligible to transfer to other Advanstar offices, Mitchell said.

Advanstar has 92 business publications, covering a range of industries such as automotive, beauty, fashion, health care and travel. It has 13 offices in the United States, mostly on the East Coast, and six in Europe, Asia and Latin America.

The move snuffs out the last Eugene piece of the once-mighty publishing business founded by Ed Aster. He sold Aster Publishing Corp. to Advanstar in late 1992. It had been a major local employer with 170 employees. Under Advanstar's ownership, the Eugene workforce dwindled to about 100 employees in 1998, then to the current 50.

The closure isn't "huge in terms of numbers, but they were good jobs," said Jack Roberts, executive director of Lane Metro Partnership, a business recruitment group.

He and others said Advanstar's decision to leave Eugene didn't come as a huge surprise.

"Ever since Aster sold, there was concern that it would lose its local connection," Roberts said.

"The problem is with any of these companies - particularly in an economic downturn - they look for ways to consolidate," he said. "It's like musical chairs, and we're the one left without a chair."

Advanstar is the latest in a string of employers that have left, or are leaving, downtown Eugene for various reasons.

Others include Symantec Corp., which moved its software customer support center to Springfield's Gateway area last year.

PeaceHealth, which is preparing to build a new medical center in Springfield, plans to shift most of its 2,200-employee Sacred Heart Medical Center workforce to the new facility in 2007.

With the loss of Advanstar, the city needs to try even harder to make itself inviting to business and to support home-grown companies, Eugene Mayor Jim Torrey said.

"We have to find ways to nurture new small companies," he said. "To get them to start in Eugene and to help find ways for them to be successful in Eugene. When we lose those corporate headquarters, it makes us vulnerable to things like this."

The Eugene office handled editorial work for Advanstar's publication, Pharmaceutical Technology, and various marketing services, such as classified advertising, reprints and list rental: renting subscriber lists to other parties, Mitchell said.

Mitchell said she didn't know exactly which offices would pick up the work. However, Advanstar has a pharmaceutical team in New Jersey and the Boston and Cleveland offices handle market development, she said.

Advanstar is a privately held company, owned by DLJ Merchant Banking Partners/Credit Suisse First Boston.

Advanstar has 1,300 employees worldwide.