New customer-contact center gets a boost from outsourcing

The service-support center that Fusion Contact Centers LLC is opening in downtown Reno reflects its customers' eagerness to take a double serving of outsourcing.

The company, which is nearing completion of extensive remodeling of a 14,084-square-foot space in the Jones Vargas Building at 300 E. Second St., soon expects to begin hiring the first 30 to 50 employees who will staff the center when it opens early next year.

Ryan Romero, vice president of operations for Scottsdale-based Fusion, says the company has continued its track record of solid growth through the recession.

Its clients, who range from big publicly traded corporations to firms that are just emerging from the start-up stage, outsource functions such as billing inquiries and technical support to Fusion centers in Arizona and Santa Maria, Calif.

The company was founded in 1999.

Along with traditional voice calls, Fusion centers also handle e-mail, text and other digital inquiries.

"Our core competency is the technology behind serving customers," Romero says.

With its decision to locate in Reno, Romero says Fusion is taking the outsourcing model a step further to capture the relatively low business costs of Nevada. It's also important, he says, for the centers to be near the major business centers of San Francisco and Los Angeles because Fusion clients often meet directly with the contact-center teams.

Fusion expects to operate with a staff of about 180 once the Reno center reaches full steam. The facility potentially could support a three-shift workforce of 300 to 500 within five years.

Romero says Fusion took a close look at the northern Nevada workforce before it made its decision.

The company hires and trains high-school graduates for its customer-contact positions and hires college-educated candidates for managerial positions.

"Labor markets are a big deal for us," he says. "We saw that Reno has a lot of talent. Our staff needs to take care of customers. It's hard to teach someone how to show empathy and take care of customers."

The average tenure of a worker in one of the company's centers is about three years, Romero says.

The Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada assisted Fusion. Mike Kazmierski, EDAWN's president and chief executive, says the new jobs help meet EDAWN's goal of creating more employment in professional and financial services positions.

Scott Shanks and Dominic Brunetti of NAI Alliance represented Basin Street Properties, the owner of the office building, in its negotiations with Fusion.