Wells Fargo to consolidate Charlotte office space
Wells Fargo has announced plans to consolidate its Charlotte office space in early 2010.
The move will affect 2,700 employees and will cut the bank’s office space by 300,000 square feet as it consolidates into 4 key buildings. Workers will move into One Wachovia Center, Two Wachovia Center, Three Wachovia Center or the Duke Energy Center at the new cultural complex at Tyron and Stonewall streets. Once the move is complete, the bank will occupy about 5 million square feet in the Charlotte area.
The bank will exit leases from it’s 4 current buildings in early 2010: Charlotte Plaza, South Tyron Square, 200 S. Tyron and 201 N. Tyron.
Wachovia Corp. originally intended to occupy about half of the 1.4 million square foot Duke Energy Center before the bank was bought by Wells Fargo. Now the bank will control 14 floors, including 4 trading floors. The trading floors are being held “for the future,” said Bob Bertges, Managing Director for corporate real estate for Wells Fargo, although he noted they could be built as regular office space if needed.
“Who knows how the world will contract and expand, but I think (Wells Fargo) has found Charlotte an attractive place to house employees,” he said.
The bank currently has around 19,500 employees uptown and has admitted there has been both a contraction and an expansion within the bank in the last fiscal year.