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Exploring How Amazon's Plan for a Second Headquarters Was Influenced by the COVID-19 Pandemic

Lanon Wee

In 2005, Amazon founder and then CEO, Jeff Bezos, faced a unique dilemma: despite having a growing presence in Seattle, sprawled across 40 office buildings and 65,000 employed staff, employees asked him if the company would ever reside in one space. To find the appropriate space, Amazon started a sweepstakes-style competition which drew 238 bids from states, provinces and cities in search of the retailer's second headquarters. This week, Amazon opened its East Coast anchor, HQ2, in northern Virginia. The first phase, called Metropolitan Park, includes two office towers which can house 14,000 of the 25,000 Amazon employees, with 8,000 expected to move in this fall. In one building, the romantic notion of having all employees together was no longer feasible, leading Bezos to decide on a second headquarters. Bezos initially proposed that Amazon remain near Puget Sound, but the idea then transformed into constructing a "neighborhood" atmosphere like its Seattle campus in another place, Schoettler mentioned. "We had the option of moving to the outskirts, and we could have cut down trees to build an isolated campus with only access routes in the north, south, east, and west. However, when we decided to locate ourselves amongst the urban landscape and form a walkable neighborhood and 18-hour district, we became externally focused and integrated into the community, which is precisely what we wanted," he explained. Sullivan, Amazon's VP of Economic Development, contended that if the firm had spread its workers around other technology hubs in North America, it would have been more difficult to create such an atmosphere. "Tech hubs contrasting with neighborhood atmosphere is what HQ2 has provided Amazon the opportunity to attain closer collaboration and be a part of the locality," Sullivan said. Amazon's much-discussed search for a 2nd headquarters has experienced some trouble. In 2018, they initiated plans to divide HQ2 between Long Island City, NY and Crystal City, VA. But amid public and political backlash, Amazon abandoned their plans for Long Island City. The company's arrival in Arlington has caused worries of increasing housing costs and displacement. Amazon has vowed to invest greater than $1 billion to construct and protect affordable housing in the area. Schoettler reported that Amazon plans to concentrate much of its upcoming growth in Arlington and the logistics hub in Nashville, TN. Furthermore, they plan to hire as many as 12,000 people in Bellevue, WA. "I don't see us getting bigger in Seattle whatsoever," Schoettler said. "I think we're pretty much maxed out there." HQ2 offers some of the same oddities as Amazon's Seattle campus, such as a banana stand with "banistas" and white boards in the building elevators. The office in Seattle has a dog-friendly concept, which applied to Metropolitan Park with a public dog park and pics of Amazon employees' pooches on the walls. The towers have plant-filled terraces and a rooftop urban farm that has a similar atmosphere to the "Spheres," botanical gardens that are the focal point of Amazon's Seattle office. Amidst an unstable climate for both Amazon and the tech industry as a whole, Amazon is establishing HQ2. Numerous major tech conglomerates, including Amazon, have had to lay off thousands of staff and scale back spending due to dipping profits and concerns of impending recession. Furthermore, employers are pondering what job functions will look like following the pandemic, as a substantial portion of workers have become accustomed to working remotely and are unwilling to return to an office. In response, Amazon instructed its corporate personnel to work from the office a minimum of three days each week, which resulted in some employees protesting the lack of flexibility. To accommodate for the expectation that staff won't be frequenting the office each day, the layout of HQ2 was revised. It features more shared workspaces and less designated seating, with employees only projected to be at their desks for 30% of the workday and the rest of the time spent in meeting rooms or conversing with colleagues. Additionally, Amazon plans for desks to not be personalized with family photos, etc., so that any employee may use the space if someone else is not present. Due to the move to a hybrid working environment, Amazon has delayed its groundbreaking of PenPlace, the second phase of its Arlington campus. PenPlace is anticipated to include three 22-story office buildings, more than 100,000 square feet of retail space, and a 350-foot-tall tower called "The Helix" featuring outdoors walkways and interior meeting areas encompassed by vegetation. Amazon will utilize how employees work in the new Metropolitan Park buildings to help design the offices at PenPlace, as per Schoettler. Amazon has not declared when the commencement of PenPlace's development might be, yet it is still carrying on with the permitting and preconstruction process, Schoettler mentioned. Sullivan declared that Amazon wants to use caution since they are just opening these buildings, as they are huge investments and the company intend to give them a long life.

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