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BuzzFeed Might Move Their Offices To A Huge Arts District Building
Netflix may have their eyes set on Hollywood, but another rapidly growing media outlet may be heading to the Arts District.
No longer just the hot new destination for craft beer and artisanal ice cream, the Arts District could serve as the new West Coast home of BuzzFeed. Sources familiar with the deal told the Wall Street Journal that the company is in talks to lease a massive 250,000-square-foot, five-story building on Santa Fe Avenue, just across from Stumptown Coffee.
The sprawling building—just south of 7th St.—was once home to a Ford Model T factory and later housed a toy factory. The move would be a sizable upgrade from BuzzFeed's current digs in the Fairfax District, and also two in Hollywood where about 230 employees make up BuzzFeed Motion Pictures, a large percentage of the company's L.A. team, according to the WSJ. The possible new location—which is being converted to an office space by Shorenstein Properties—could potentially house 1,500 to 2,500 employees if used as a standard office building. There's no word yet on exactly how the company would use the space, but building is thought to be a way to consolidate the company's three other locations.
News of the Arts District speculation comes soon after BuzzFeed received a $200 million investment from NBCUniversal earlier this month. According to the WSJ, that investment could involve collaborating with the media giant on "television content, movies, the Olympics, and joint partnerships with brands and ad agencies." All of which would likely require a sizable amount of space.
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Should BuzzFeed decide to move into the neighborhood of rapidly sprouting coffee shops and mustaches, their new L.A. location would be roughly the same size as the company's headquarters in Manhattan. It would also make the company one of the biggest tech start-ups in L.A. by square-footage, according to the WSJ, beating out Amazon or Snapchat and in the ballpark of Google.
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