New York State offers tax credits to the Film & Gaming Industry

What do movies like The Natural, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2, Nightmare Alley, A Man Called Otto, Best Friends, and A Quiet Place II have in common? Besides not starring yours truly, they were all filmed in Buffalo Niagara. Our region’s accessibility, diversity, and world class architecture has made Western New York an attractive movie backdrop for a long time - just ask the Buffalo Niagara Film Office.

Burgeoning support industries help build on our previous successes - local film studios, digital rendering and effects companies, Villa Maria College, the University at Buffalo’s Center for Computational Research (one of the nation's leading supercomputing centers), and RIT’s new MAGIC Spell Studios and may others work as an ensemble to grow and evolve the Film and Gaming ecosystem in WNY. 

Why Buffalo Niagara for the Film & Gaming Industry?
Our strategic location on the Canadian border puts us 2 hours from Toronto and 6 hours from New York.  Need more convincing? How about our region’s growing collaborative ecosystem, geographic diversity and accessibility for film, a robust talent pipeline, widespread 5G deployment, a low-cost business climate and lucrative state incentives including: 

Film & TV Production Tax Credit
Eligible productions may apply for a tax credit of 30% of qualified production expenses. Productions with a minimum budget of $500,000 may receive an additional 10% credit on qualified labor expenses, including qualified above-the-line wages. Learn More > 

Post-Production Tax Credit
Eligible productions may also be eligible for a fully refundable tax credit of 30% of qualified post-production expenses. An additional 5% credit may be available in the Post-Production Program for costs incurred in Upstate NY and projects with budgets over $500,000 can receive an additional 10% credit on qualified labor expenses. Learn More > 

Digital Game Development Tax Credit
Qualified WNY digital game development studios can apply to receive tax credits of 35%. To be eligible, the entity must be engaged in a qualified digital gaming media production and must have a minimum of $100,000 total production costs. Qualified production costs must be at least 75% of all production costs. Learn More>

New York State Entertainment Workforce Diversity Grant
This program provides financial assistance in the form of grants for job creation and training programs that support efforts to recruit, retain and train a diverse and inclusive workforce for the motion picture and television production and post-production industries. Grants ranging from $25,000 to $500,000 can be awarded to eligible applicants. Learn More >

Since 2011, over 2,300 applications have been accepted into the New York State Film Tax Credit Program for both production and post-production projects; that success has only reinforced the Empire State’s commitment to the industry.

Buffalo Niagara has long been at the forefront of innovation and creativity. Our region is well-prepared to capture the impending opportunity in Film and Gaming and our team at Invest Buffalo Niagara welcomes you to leverage our experience and project management assistance. 

 Tags: Film & Gaming

In mid-September Invest Buffalo Niagara hosted a reporter from Site Selection Magazine for a two-and-a-half day visit throughout the region. 

In mid-September Invest Buffalo Niagara hosted a reporter from Site Selection Magazine for a two-and-a-half day visit throughout the region. 

Plastic injection molding. Food processing. Steel fabrication. All of these industries have one thing in common: Heavy power use. These operations often run multiple shifts or even 24 hours per day using an immense amount of power. Soaring operational costs, especially utility costs and energy needs, are a hot topic for companies across the nation. The Buffalo Niagara region offers a solution: A combination of low electric utility costs and unique incentive programs like hydropower allocation. 

One of the most important ways Invest Buffalo Niagara can assist companies with an expansion project is through the identification of suitable commercial real estate.  Utilizing our vast market knowledge and close relationships with the commercial real estate professionals across our region, Invest Buffalo Niagara conducts site searches and presents the findings to our prospects in a timely, detail-orientated manner.  Similar to the consideration of incentive programs, there are some important factors to keep in mind before engaging in a commercial real estate search for a business expansion project.

 Tags: site selection Buffalo Niagara region Buffalo Niagara Commercial Real Estate

Many businesses are utilizing these unprecedented times to strategize on business growth and innovation.  Growing your business – whether it is through the development of new products, entering new markets, or organic market opportunities – often requires additional staff and an increased physical footprint.  Here are some important considerations companies should have top of mind before the business expansion process begins.

 Tags: Incentives US business expansion business expansion

In which geographies is your business, or even your employees, equipment, and building, at risk of catastrophic natural disasters?

Not in Buffalo Niagara.

Buffalo Niagara is one of the safest areas from natural disasters. The risk for a business is significantly lower and should be considered when weighing location decisions for relocations or expansions.

Trulia and CityLab named Buffalo the fourth safest city from natural disasters in 2017. The story also points out that Western New York is affordable, on top of being safe (Check out our Cost of Living Calculator to crunch the numbers yourself).

This map below from The New York Times also shows how safe from natural disasters the Buffalo Niagara region is.



The map specifically values earthquakes lower than other disasters because of their relative infrequency, which may be why the West Coast is surprisingly covered in green circles. Though they may be infrequent, when a quake does hit, damage can be lasting. Buffalo Niagara is virtually untouched by the sprawling effects of tornado, hurricane, and earthquakes.

But, what about the snow you say?

To a certain extent, that’s fair. The international image of Buffalo is one covered in snow. And we’d be lying if we told you it didn’t snow here. There’s also 205 sunny days a year, but yes, it snows a bit. However, not as much as people think and well… snow is fun. Snow creates a fourth season to enjoy. In Buffalo, snow allows outdoor enthusiasts exercise and bliss of activities like snowboarding, skiing, sledding, and ice skating. Yes, it snows a bit.

More importantly, when the snow does hit, we’re prepared for it. Buffalo Niagara is built for snow, with the infrastructure and equipment to operate almost completely unaffected. The climate in Buffalo Niagara is actually a benefit to certain companies. Large data centers often run the risk of technology overheating and food processing companies can struggle to keep required temperatures.

When Invest Buffalo Niagara helped to attract Oath (Yahoo at the time) to Western New York, one of the big reasons for their ultimate decision was the safety from risk and temperate climate that could be used to naturally cool equipment.

Our region is well-equipped to handle snow and even storms, with a large plow network and removal operation. And, most importantly, snow melts. Hurricanes, tornados, and earthquakes do lasting and irreversible damage. It’s risky business.

 Tags: Advanced Manufacturing Advanced Business Services

There was a time in Buffalo Niagara’s not too distant past where industrial real estate availability hovered around or above the double-digits, absorption rates were routinely negative and the local economy suffered mightily as manufacturing operations closed shop permanently or moved overseas.

 Tags: site selection

Invest Buffalo Niagara's Economic Guide is a comprehensive data source for the most significant information on the regional economy.

 Tags: Buffalo Niagara

At Invest Buffalo Niagara, our job is to attract new companies to the Western New York region, creating jobs for our neighbors and investment for our neighborhoods.

 Tags: Success Story

Buffalo Niagara’s general economic resurgence has been positively impacted by the diversification of industries in our economy, however advanced manufacturing remains our third largest industry sector with 66,000 employees.

 Tags: Advanced Manufacturing

Over the past few months, Invest Buffalo Niagara undertook an extensive study of the advanced business services industry in our region. The research team interviewed and polled stakeholders and compiled qualitative and quantitative data on specific industry, subsectors, companies, occupations, education programs and training opportunities.

 Tags: Advanced Business Services

Another successful Site Selectors Guild Fall Forum is in the books.  It is always beneficial for economic developers to interact with site selection consultants to build new relationships and nurture existing ones, as well as learn about developing industry trends and best practices.  I was fortunate to be joined by several Upstate NY economic development colleagues in Greenville, South Carolina at the event, which was highlighted by five breakout sessions focused on the theme “The Risk of Complacency.”

 Tags: site selection