Creativity is king in down commercial market
June 11, 2010 | Dan Rafter | Print Article | Email this Article
Earlier this week I interviewed John Komlos, vice president with St. Louis-based ARCO Construction Company. We talked about the job his company did transforming a space originally designed for office/warehouse into a youth hockey rink.
The work wasn’t easy. And the company had to subcontract with Little Canada, Minn.-based Rink-Tec, which actually built and installed the rink’s frozen floor. But the job wrapped up earlier this year, and the youth hockey club that now calls the rink home is thrilled with its new digs.
The job was certainly an interesting one. But what was even more interesting was the creativity behind it. Komlos admitted to me that ARCO never would have considered transforming its space into a hockey rink during the commercial real estate boom times. During those years, ARCO would have leased the space to office/warehouse users with little problem.
Those days are long gone, though. Today, companies like ARCO have to be creative. It’s the only way to fill some of the vacant space on the market.
ARCO still has some space to fill in its St. Louis office/warehouse facility, 18,750, to be exact. But the company eliminated more than 30,000 square feet when it turned part of its facility into an ice rink.
It’s a cliche’, but ARCO thought outside the box. And that’s increasingly necessary in today’s commercial real estate world.
Tags | ARCO Construction Company, industrial, Little Canada, Minnesota, Office, St. Louis
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