The ribbon-cutting ceremony Tuesday at Chicago’s new Salesforce Tower represents a milestone on the road to recovery for Chicago’s struggling commercial real estate market.
The 1.2 million-square-foot Pelli, Clarke and Partners-designed building on the city's historic Wolf Point incorporates new design touches and new thinking about how office spaces will be used.
"We really tried to make our design more residential, because people have been home in the pandemic for two years," said Relina Bulchandani, Salesforce’s executive vice president for real estate.
Bulchandani pointed to the tower’s use of healthy and sustainable materials, along with its light-filled workspaces. She called the space, which has been adding employees floor by floor since this Spring, a place where employees and guests can be connected to themselves, their work and their teams.
The top two floors will be called the "Ohana Floors," from the Hawaiian word for "family."
"Instead of dedicating the top floor of this tower for executive offices, we are taking an innovative approach, offering these top floors as flexible hospitality spaces for the community," said Sebastian V. Niles, the company's chief legal officer.
The floors, which will be open to employees during the day, feature a two-story barista bar and a gourmet kitchen where a culinary staff will prepare snacks and other dishes.
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As the company prepared to welcome dignitaries for a party in the evening, employees were also setting up volunteering spaces where they planned to do things like pack backpacks with school supplies to give to teachers.
When asked about whether or not the innovations will be enough to bring employees back from working at home, Bulchandani said the No. 1 thing employees have asked for is the ability to make connections and meet with each other.
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Slowly, Chicago's commercial real estate market is coming back. Kastle Systems, which measures occupancy through access control card data, estimates that Chicago office spaces are at 52.5% occupancy. The city is showing the second highest big city growth after Austin, Texas.
Ald. Brendan Reilly admited that Chicago has been struggling with downtown vacancy rates. He looks at the Salesforce Tower Chicago as a positive.
"We are talking 22-hundred employees right here at Wolf Point," he said. "That supports River North. That supports the Loop. It’s good for the downtown economy."
