AT&T Inc.'s Yellow Pages will keep its headquarters and 655 jobs in downtown St. Louis, the company and state and local officials said Thursday. The Yellow Pages business also will add 100 positions at a sales center in Olivette.
The announcement comes four months after the San Antonio-based telecommunications giant closed its $86 billion purchase of BellSouth Corp. That company's hometown of Atlanta lobbied hard to pry AT&T's advertising and publishing division out of St. Louis, AT&T officials said.
However, the division, publisher of the Yellow Pages, decided to stay put.
"There are a lot of locations that would love to have a company of our size," said Dennis Payne, president and chief executive of the $5.6 billion division, the largest U.S. directory company. "We think St. Louis is a good city to run a national business from."
Payne made the announcement to the cheers of hundreds of AT&T employees gathered in the lobby of their downtown building. About 6,500 people work for AT&T in St. Louis, including 655 at the advertising and publishing headquarters. Company spokesmen said there were no plans to cut any other jobs here due to the purchase of BellSouth.
And that news will settle the minds of employees who for months have been uncertain about their fate, said publishing manager Terrell Tate.
"At least now we can rest assured of our jobs for a while," Tate said as he watched the announcement. "It's great we are staying in St. Louis. For sure, this city is a great place to stay economically."
It was good news to Mayor Francis Slay, too. Slay joined Gov. Matt Blunt, St. Louis County Executive Charlie Dooley and other local officials on the dais with Payne, and said he was glad to see his city on the winning end of a big corporate merger.
"Mergers and acquisitions have not always been friendly to the city of St. Louis," Slay said.
This one also will be friendly to Olivette. AT&T plans to add 100 jobs there, doubling the size of a sales center that sells ad space in both print and online versions of the Yellow Pages, which runs 1,200 directories nationwide.
The company probably will receive state tax credits under the Missouri Quality Jobs Program, said Blunt, who traveled to AT&T's headquarters to urge the company to stay in St. Louis.
Keeping another headquarters — even if it's a big divisional headquarters — is a nice feather in St. Louis' cap, said Richard Fleming, president of the Regional Chamber & Growth Association.
"It's nice to beat Atlanta in something other than baseball," Fleming said.
By Tim Logan
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH