Scottsdale, Ariz., to Get New Dial Corp. Headquarters

July 17, 2006
Firm to move north in city to make way for expansion

Jul. 15--Phoenix lobbied hard to snag soap-maker Dial Corp.'s new headquarters, but Scottsdale's cachet won the day.

Dial said Friday it has staked out space at One Scottsdale, local developer DMB's planned residential, retail and office project north of Loop 101 on the east side of Scottsdale Road.

The company plans to build its corporate offices and Center for Innovation, Dial's research and development facility, in the upscale masterplanned commercial development just three miles north of its current Scottsdale Airpark quarters.

The land deal is expected to close in about two months. Neither Dial nor DMB would disclose the price.

Dial hopes to break ground in the fall and move into its new quarters in mid-2008, CEO Brad Casper said.

Dial plans to build a single multistory structure with 350,000 to 400,000 square feet of office and research space -- enough to house its 700 local employees and their labs and still have room for a 20 percent to 30 percent expansion in staff, Casper said.

The company also needs room to accommodate another expansion of more than 20 percent, he said.

The building design depended on the site selected, so it has not been completed yet, Casper said.

The actual size of the campus, height of the building and cost of construction won't be available for several months, he said.

Dial established its headquarters in the Scottsdale Airpark 10 years ago when the company split along its product lines -- financial services became Viad and consumer products claimed the corporate name Dial.

The new Dial operation moved to property adjacent to its research labs, which had been in Scottsdale since 1976.

The research facility will get the heave-ho in 2008 when its long-term lease is up, so landowners can build a shopping center on the property. That sparked the need for a new home.

Casper narrowed the options to north Scottsdale and northeast Phoenix, where most employees live.

Phoenix quickly rezoned 25 acres in its bustling Desert Ridge area just weeks ago to make sure that property was ready to build without delay.

The economics of both sites was about the same, said John Wyss, managing principal of The Staubach Company's Phoenix office. Wyss has been piloting Dial's site search for more than a year.

But Dial's scientists, executives and marketing staff were more likely to live in Scottsdale than Phoenix, he said.

Casper said it was a close decision.

"In the end it came down to our perception about the best place for our employees, and the type of environment we wanted," Casper said. "The quality of life was a little higher in north Scottsdale. It was the vision for One Scottsdale that stood out."

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