this can be improved if you create a utility method in order to validate the string like this (put the method in helper):

........... String stringValidator(String stringToValidate, String defaultValue){
       return StringUtils.isNotBlank(stringToValidate)? stringToValidate : defaultValue
}

then call it like this:

 snippetVar_shipToCity =stringValidator(billingShippingHelper.getShipToCity(), "");