CHICAGO | Economic & Business Development

[pullmanman]

Crain's

One of Chicago's fastest-growing companies is moving and doubling the size of its Loop headquarters, making room for as many as 200 people it aims to hire by the end of this year.

Consulting firm Inspire11 is leasing nearly 23,000 square feet at 1 N. Dearborn St., CEO Alban Mehmeti confirmed. The company, which helps clients including Northern Trust and other large firms use data and other digital tools to boost business, will move later this year from a nearly 12,000-square-foot office at 1 E. Wacker Drive.

They plan on roughly doubling their workforce from 200 local employees to 400 over the next year. This space would be awfully crowded for that many employees. The CEO said a lot of their hires only come in a few days a week and can use common amenity areas of the building if their leased space is too full. I'd imagine this is pretty indicative of the kind of leases we'll see from smaller, fast-growing companies in the future.

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by pullmanman

Crain's



They plan on roughly doubling their workforce from 200 local employees to 400 over the next year. This space would be awfully crowded for that many employees. The CEO said a lot of their hires only come in a few days a week and can use common amenity areas of the building if their leased space is too full. I'd imagine this is pretty indicative of the kind of leases we'll see from smaller, fast-growing companies in the future.

They are a consulting firm, so yeah it makes sense. I've talked about it a lot here, but this has been the norm for consulting firms for YEARS way before the pandemic. A lot of people are on projects with clients out of the area and maybe traveling for it, or perhaps smaller ones where they work remotely. Many scenarios. I was on a project while a consultant where I was in NYC every week for a few years. There were over 10 people in my office with me on that from Chicago too. And other coworkers of mine were on projects traveling all over ..LA, Atlanta, Miami, Seattle, Dallas, etc. It didn't even make sense for any of us to have any permanent desk space for multiple years. Some others had remote clients but no travel and they worked from home way before the pandemic. I had many coworkers who did WFH for years. There were coworkers of mine who I never saw in person for over 5 years. Maybe 4 times a year I'd hear them on a conference call (not video call). Many people I never met. This was way before the pandemic and nobody ever complained about the literal thousands of consultants who were employed by downtown firms who never came into the office for years.

Anybody who knows consulting won't be surprised the least bit. It would have been the same story in 2012 with the office space requirements and will before that.

[marothisu]

According to the latest LAU data from the BLS, the number of employed persons living in the City of Chicago from February was the most of any month dating back until October 2000....

[left of center]

Wow, good news!

Something I've noticed... It seems that our jobs numbers are perpetually looking optimistic, but our population numbers are always lackluster when compared to our peers (not counting the census estimate for 2021 which was dismal for all major cities due to the pandemic). Is it just me, or does something not seem to add up with that?

[the urban politician]

^ Children are disappearing. They don't have jobs

[galleyfox]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

^ Children are disappearing. They don't have jobs

No, it’s something directly related to the labor estimates.

Chicago’s MSA birth data is not bad compared to other cities.

But BLS has been recording a decline in the labor force since 2014 just like the census estimates.

Now all of a sudden these BLSs estimates are all, “Woah, woah, nevermind, fake news. Go back to the year 2000 numbers.”

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by galleyfox

No, it’s something directly related to the labor estimates.

Chicago’s MSA birth data is not bad compared to other cities.

But BLS has been recording a decline in the labor force since 2014 just like the census estimates.

Now all of a sudden these BLSs estimates are all, “Woah, woah, nevermind, fake news. Go back to the year 2000 numbers.”

Well part of what TUP is saying isn't wrong. Household size IS decreasing but households are almost at their peak. So it stands that the population with jobs is increasing but the pct of them having kids is decreasing.

But I also don't trust the population estimates. They have messed up va. 2 Censuses now so...

[left of center]

Yeah, the Census estimated have been absolutely terrible for the last 2 decades, especially for older cities like Chicago. Were they always this bad? I was too young to pay attention to them pre-2000.

[Randomguy34]

Chicago being one of the only legacy cities to have a current employment count higher than pre-pandemic is reaallllyy confusing. We've been having strong growth in logistics/storage, it would be interesting to see how many jobs are being generated

[galleyfox]

Originally Posted by Randomguy34

Chicago being one of the only legacy cities to have a current employment count higher than pre-pandemic is reaallllyy confusing. We've been having strong growth in logistics/storage, it would be interesting to see how many jobs are being generated

https://ides.illinois.gov/content/da...to-current.xls

[marothisu]

Someone a month or so ago mentioned that LAUS may not be the most accurate thing and QCEW is better. Just to come full circle with that, here's MSAs from Jan '21 to Sep '21 change in employed persons. Not *AS* rosy as LAUS but still good..


Again, these are MSAs
* Las Vegas: +11.29%
* San Diego: +7.74%
* Orlando: +7.44%
* Los Angeles: +6.52%
* San Francisco: +6.44%
* Austin: +6.31%
* Seattle: +5.81%
* San Jose: +5.77%
* Portland: +5.5%
* Boston: +5.26%
* Chicago: +5.06%
* NYC: +5.03%
* Sacramento: +4.98%
* Denver: +4.88%
* Riverside, CA: +4.76%
* Detroit: +4.72%
* Nashville: +4.35%
* Dallas: +4.16%
* San Antonio: +4.03%
* Raleigh: +4%
* Pittsburgh: +3.83%
* Houston: +3.75%
* Baltimore: +3.68%
* Philadelphia: +3.67%
* DC: +3.65%
* Indianapolis: +3.49%
* Minneapolis: +3.39%
* Milwaukee: +3.25%
* Miami: +3.08%
* St. Louis: +3.01%
* Tampa: +3.01%
* Atlanta: +3%
* Cincinnati: +2.78%
* Jacksonville: +2.78%
* Cleveland: +2.77%
* Oklahoma City: +2.73%
* Charlotte: +2.46%
* Phoenix: +2.33%
* Richmond, VA: +2.33%
* Louisville: +2.31%
* Columbus, OH: +2.26%
* Memphis: +2.16%
* Virginia Beach: +1.91%
* Kansas City: +1.84%
* New Orleans: -3.58%

[thegoatman]

Illinois economy is gonna break $1 trillion this year. Will be the 5th trillion dollar economy just behind CA, TX, NY, and FL. Chicago has the 7th largest economy of any city just behind Tokyo, New York, LA, Paris, London, and Seoul. All world class cities, very impressive company.

https://www.bea.gov/system/files/inl...state0322b.png

2021 State GDP in millions of dollars:

CA $3,514,348
TX $2,104,579
NY $1,914,207
FL $1,286,086
IL $973,486
PA $874,881
OH $765,003
GA $713,948
NJ $700,119
WA $696,748
NC $684,607
MA $663,750
VA $614,714
MI $592,349
MD $451,986
CO $440,903
MN $429,391
TN $439,050
IN $438,012
AZ $429,819
WI $379,909
MO $373,105
CT $208,671
SC $281,754
OR $279,424
LA $267,126
AL $257,465
KY $244,480
UT $230,342
IA $225,696
OK $218,564
NV $204,306
KS $198,291
DC $156,457
NE $154,149
AR $150,483
MS $129,974
NM $114,680
NH $102,439
ID $98,455
HI $94,937
WV $91,953
DE $84,206
ME $79,177
RI $68,823
ND $66,372
SD $62,809
MT $61,983
AK $57,983
WY $44,323
VT $37,644

[Randomguy34]

This seems pretty significant, anyone have access to the article?

Originally Posted by Randomguy34

Google Negotiating Major Expansion of Offices in Chicago's Fulton Market
https://www.costar.com/article/17444...-fulton-market

Update:

Originally Posted by Randomguy34

Crain's published their article on it and said Google is the new anchor tenant for 400 N Aberdeen, which was aimed at recruiting life sciences with new lab space. No word if Google is still pursuing Sterling Bay's proposal for 1000 W Carroll. Now that there's less supply for lab space, Crain's is suggesting this will help boost leasing efforts for 315 N May.

Crains article: https://www.chicagobusiness.com/comm...ansion-chicago

[OrdoSeclorum]

Originally Posted by Randomguy34

This seems pretty significant, anyone have access to the article?



Update:

It does seems significant. Article says Google was going to build their own building before the pandemic, but it got killed during the lockdown. Google has increased local employment from ~1000 to $1,800 in the last few years and plans a significant hiring expansion in Chicago due to talent availability, cost and ease of retention, though no specific numbers were given. Author claims this is a bullish sign for office leasing downtown and offices in general and that Fulton market is hot.

[tjp]

That's awesome, but what a weird location for an office building. Almost seems too far to be considered Fulton Market..

[marothisu]

I wonder how much of this is growing by hundreds during remote work and needing space now that they've returned to the office vs. Future headcount growth plans.

[k1052]

Originally Posted by marothisu

I wonder how much of this is growing by hundreds during remote work and needing space now that they've returned to the office vs. Future headcount growth plans.

This is a real problem for companies that continued to aggressively hire during the last two years. Yeah many kept leasing but a lot of that space isn't ready due to supply chain issues so they are way short of seats.

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by k1052

This is a real problem for companies that continued to aggressively hire during the last two years. Yeah many kept leasing but a lot of that space isn't ready due to supply chain issues so they are way short of seats.

My office fairly aggressively hired and technically we aren't too far below capacity. At this rate we may have an issue. Some companies who have returned to the office have partially solved this by having hybrid schedules but using a cohort approach (i.e. not all teams are in the office together on any given day...some could be in on Fridays while others are at home).

[Randomguy34]

I can only speak on academia, but there has been a sharper rise in graduate school apps since the pandemic, even though the amount of funding hasn't changed or decreased for some schools. I've heard from a couple of STEM departments that what would be considered an exceptional applicant one year is now the norm for new applicants. This should be a compelling case for schools to expand their grad programs, such as UChicago with their quantum program, but it'll be difficult unless there's a new source of funding

[k1052]

Originally Posted by marothisu

My office fairly aggressively hired and technically we aren't too far below capacity. At this rate we may have an issue. Some companies who have returned to the office have partially solved this by having hybrid schedules but using a cohort approach (i.e. not all teams are in the office together on any given day...some could be in on Fridays while others are at home).

I have heard from a few people who are still fully remote even though their companies have offically "returned to office" at least on certain days due to space constraints instead of adopting a cohort schedule. It is kind of a mess.