Quote:
Originally Posted by marothisu
It is probably the most remote of possibilities of the mentioned sites, but it's not completely out of the question. Banks like Chase do have a ton of young/young-ish tech workers and just like many other tech companies, continue to look to attract the same types of workers for the most part in a quieter manner. If they were looking to lease something like 250K-350K sq ft instead of 1M sq ft then Fulton Market might make even more sense. At the same time though, they want to sometimes be seen as more hip.
At the same time though, my money is on 130 N Franklin or the Madison site if getting a new site is truly what the deal is.
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We're in agreement. I'm not taking Fulton Market completely off the table precisely because of that pressure corporations in a wide range of industries feels to attract younger tech workers. However, I think it's highly unlikely Chase gets talked into diving whole-hog into that bait with this kind of move. Note: Not impossible.
The more I think about it, 401 S Wacker may be on par with 130 N Franklin. At any rate, it's close. While I'd absolutely give an edge to 130 on absolute location irrespective of views and visibility, the showstopper views of, and from 401 would be incredibly appealing to a company that really wanted to make a statement. And they'd be able to one-up Bank of America (and yes BMO too - but really Bank of America as they are more direct peers in terms of size and scale nationally and in Chicago) fairly easily, in highly visible fashion. However, as others have pointed out, the available footprint here might be an issue, and I don't know what the maximum tower dimensions available look like, and it might be a real stretch (literally) to build something of the size that would really justify a Chase Chicago hq-like anchor lease.
As for 130, I think I've mentioned before, what they could do is redesign so that the tower is shifted to the north of the site, up against Randolph. This would improve visibility and views to/from the west, as it would be offset from 110 North Wacker (where of course BofA is now located). Would Chase though - even if they build a much more noteworthy architectural addition and potentially larger/taller trophy at 130 - opt to locate so close to BofA when BofA's building is just so much more visible with better or mostly better views (just by nature of it being between the River and Wacker)? I don't know, and perhaps I'm overthinking it a bit. I guarantee though that they are putting a tremendous amount of thought into this competitive aspect of its Chicago real estate decision - all of their major competitors really but again I'd think especially BofA - and this goes for the experience and image for its workforce (and attracting its future workforce) as well as for its clients.
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