A 70,000-square-foot expansion of Life Time Inc.’s Chanhassen headquarters will house the company’s real estate, construction, engineering and architecture divisions as the company expands nationally.
The $26 million to $30 million project at 2902 Corporate Place is across a parking lot from the fitness chain’s current, 100,000-square-foot corporate offices. Construction of the two-story building started about a month ago, said Tom Bergmann, Life Time’s chief financial officer. About 300 members of Life Time Inc’s in-house construction services and real estate divisions will move into the building late next year.
The corporate campus at the southeast corner of highways 5 and 41 is a small part of the company’s real estate footprint. Life Time has 24 athletic clubs in Minnesota totaling nearly 3 million square feet of space. The company owns 140 clubs nationwide and is on pace to open about a dozen new clubs this year, according to a company spokeswoman.
The company is also planning a co-working office space in the West End Plaza office park in St. Louis Park. Life Time will start construction of a new athletic club at the Southdale Center regional shopping center in Edina next year. That development will also include co-working space.
The company decided to build more office space to keep up with future hiring, Bergmann said. The existing 100,000-square-foot building has no room for more corporate employees. That building opened in 2007.
“We’re 100 percent occupied in the current office location,” he said in a Monday interview. “Given our projected growth, we will continue to add team members at the corporate office.”
Life Time has about 800 employees working in its headquarters. That number is expected to grow in the coming years, but the company has no specific hiring goals, Bergmann said. Life Time employs about 35,000 people, with about 5,400 of them in Minnesota.
The new office building will have the feel of the company’s Life Time Work locations, Bergmann said, with an open and collaborative design.
The design of office space for construction companies and related services has become more sophisticated of late to attract employees, Tim Worke, CEO of the Associated General Contractors of Minnesota, said in an interview last year with Finance & Commerce.
“They’re in a war for talent as well,” he said. “Construction companies can’t be in a dirty dusty warehouse building out in the suburbs.”
