Kohl’s Corp. announced today that it has dropped its plans to build a new 900,000-square-foot corporate headquarters campus in the Woodland Prime Office Park in Menomonee Falls.
Instead the department store company plans to purchase the 300,000-square-foot former Innoware building at W165 N5830 Ridgewood Dr., located in the Silver Spring Corporate Park and directory across the street from Kohl’s current headquarters at N56 W17000 Ridgewood Dr., Menomonee Falls. The company also plans to purchase the 28,000-square-foot former ProHealth Care medical building at W165 N5595 Creekwood Crossing, located across Silver Spring Drive from Silver Spring Corporate Park.
“Combined, these two new facilities will give us the ability to add up to 360,000 square feet of space for our corporate operations,” the company said in a statement. “This is an increase of over 40 percent of our current capacity.”
The former Innoware building will be converted into a corporate facility for Kohl’s IT workers.
“The space in our current headquarters building that is currently occupied by IT associates will be used to support our ongoing growth, and will allow us to consider other building upgrades, such as additional meeting rooms and an expansion of our cafeteria area, including additional seating and dining options,” the company’s statement said.
The ProHealth Care building will house an employee wellness center and fitness facility. The company will use its current wellness center, a 24,000-square-foot facility located at W165 N5800 Ridgewood Drive, as a childcare center.
The company said it plans to make no changes to its photo studio at 11300 W. Heather Dr., Milwaukee, to its credit center at N54 W13600 Woodale Dr., Menomonee Falls, or its Lake Park office at 7800 N. 113th St., Milwaukee.
Last year the company announced plans to build a new 900,000-square-foot “second corporate campus” in Woodland Prime, located northwest of U.S. Highway 45 and Good Hope Road. The company acquired more than 105 acres and a 55,000-square-foot building there from the village to expand and build the office complex. As part of the deal, the village acquired a 530,000-square-foot distribution center at N54 W13901 Woodale Dr. from Kohl’s to be used as a public works facility.
The development agreement with Kohl’s will be wound down and the 105 acres at Woodland Prime will be deeded back to the village at no cost, said Village Manager Mark Fitzgerald. The village originally acquired that land from Strong Funds founder Richard Strong for $1.4 million and it is now worth about $10 million, Fitzgerald said. The village will market the land to developers for class A office development, he said.
Despite Kohl’s decision to drop its plans for a second corporate campus, village officials are relieved that the company is still based and growing in Menomonee Falls, Fitzgerald said.
“The fundamental goal was keeping Kohl’s here and helping them grow and expand here,” he said. “We’re not disappointed.”
The decision last year by Kohl’s to keep its headquarters in Menomonee Falls and build a second campus there came after the company considered plans to build a new corporate headquarters in downtown Milwaukee. The company considered building a new headquarters complex with more than 1 million square feet of space, for 4,500 to 5,000 employees, in the Park East corridor. City officials made an aggressive offer to Kohl’s including tax incremental financing of more than $100 million and a new markets tax credit package of about $170 million (the benefit of that to the company would have been worth about $25 million).
Kevin Mansell, Kohl’s chairman, president and CEO said last year that the company also had considered the option of moving the company’s headquarters to another state.
