From The St. Louis Post Dispatch:



By Martin Van Der Werf

Of the Post-Dispatch

06/30/2005



JINGLE JUNGLE: Three downtown advertising agencies are changing quarters, and a fourth is thinking about it. It appears to be just a coincidence, but this could be a sign of a strengthening office market.



Arnold Worldwide, with about 50 workers, is leaving the Gateway One building, 701 Market Street, for new space being built for it in the Fashion Square Building at 13th Street and Washington Avenue.



Fuse Advertising has bought its own building, 800 North First Street on Laclede's Landing. Fuse, which has about 25 employees, is vacating rented space at 1409 Washington.



Core has to move out of the A.D. Brown Building at Washington and Tucker, which is being converted to loft condominiums. Core, with a staff of about 20, will decamp for the nearby Shell Building at 1221 Locust Street.



Finally, Rodgers Townsend, the area's largest ad firm with 80 employees, might buy part of a Cupples Station warehouse that is being renovated by Conrad Properties. However, ad agency partner Tim Rodgers cautions that it is very early in the negotiations. The ad shop is now in rented space near 14th Street and Chouteau Avenue.

So basically it's the same downtown workers shuffling around to different buildings. Not really a net gain at all.

Gateway One has taken some big hits lately. A-B just moved offices from Gateway One to BofA Plaza across the street and now Arnold is leaving.



While there may not be a net gain in terms of new firms opening up downtown, I gotta believe that each firm is going to be leasing more space than they had in their previous buildings, which is positive. And as ad agencies get bigger and bigger, they spawn more and more agencies.



And good news is that these firms are moving to historic buildings, showing that there is definitely a market for office space in these properties.

^ And the really good news is that they are not leaving downtown or the metro area!

And a few months National System (advertising services) moved from Westport to downtown. Hopefully more will follow!