Big win for Hartford as Insurity picks Sawtooth site for new HQ - By Carol Latter and Diane Weaver Dunne

Insurity President Jeffrey Glazer says his company, which develops software for insurance companies, has been “growing dramatically, year after year,” and has been on the lookout for a new corporate headquarters. The Sawtooth Building offers unique advantages, he says, “and we’re very excited about it.”

Plans call for the entire building to be restored in keeping with the stringent requirements of the National Park Service and the National Register of Historic Places. Colt Gateway LLC, the HFA Holdings subsidiary developing the park, has applied for the entire 17-acre campus to become a national historic park. This status would effectively make the property — formerly home to the internationally famous Colt Firearms factory — a national landmark.

When the transformation of the Sawtooth Building is complete, its exterior will look almost exactly as it did when it was built some 80 years ago. The interior, says Glazer, will house a state-of-the-art technology center.

Among the improvements slated for the building are the replacement of all windows and skylights, the installation of high-quality wiring for computers, and the construction of an elevated floor to conceal that wiring and the building’s heating systems. Although the unrestored building is still in a rough state, the final result will be polished.

“This will be our executive headquarters, so we’re going to have a very well-groomed executive area. We’re going to have a huge library room of all of our software, and the manuals we use to develop the software,” Glazer says. “We’re also going to develop a lunchroom area and install showers so people can go jogging in the park. It’s going to have all of the amenities of a really plush facility.”

The company plans to move during March, and hopes to have all of its employees settled into Insurity’s new home by April 1.

Glazer says several things prompted Insurity’s decision to move. “First, we wanted to have one major facility” rather than three smaller ones, he says. “And being a technology company, we didn’t want to be in an office tower with an elevator. We wanted something unique and different, and this is definitely going to be unique and different.”

Currently, Insurity’s 350 employees occupy about 40,000 square feet in East Hartford, 15,000 square feet in Hartford, and another 7,500 square feet in Danbury. Glazer says some of its Danbury operations, but not all of them, will be transferred to Hartford.

Insurity also wanted to be part of the Hartford community, widely billed as “New England’s Rising Star,” because of the economic development, educational, cultural and housing projects under way in the city.

The new site, located near the junction of I-84 and I-91, is within walking distance of downtown. “The location is great,” Glazer says. “It maximizes efficiency and minimizes people’s commutes.”

Insurity’s principals first learned about the Sawtooth property during a conversation with Harry Freeman, executive director of the Hartford Economic Development Commission (HEDC).

“We were working with Harry Freeman at the HEDC and he mentioned the Colt building to us. He said, ‘If you want to be in Hartford, I want to help you,’ and he introduced us to the Colt building,” Glazer says.

“We liked it because it’s a unique building, with high ceilings, and the windows bring a lot of light into the building. We thought it would be perfect for our needs. It’s also basically part of history.”

Robert Saunders, director of design and construction at Coltsville, says the Sawtooth Building was formerly a machine shop, but has been vacant since Colt moved out in the mid-1980s. The 14-foot ceilings in the 1920s vintage building extend to 25 feet where skylights form what is commonly referred to as sawteeth, giving the building its name.

Believed to be the largest Sawtooth building in the nation, the 95,000-square-foot building offers an abundance of natural light, a key attraction for Insurity. Glazer notes that the staff — especially the IT employees — prefer natural light over artificial light because of their heavy computer monitor use.

The cost to replace the extensive number of windows and skylights in the building is estimated at $1.2 million, Saunders says. Those windows include seven rows of 8-foot skylights that span 450 feet. Windows will also surround three-quarters of the cavernous one-story building.

The total renovation and preservation costs of the Sawtooth Building are estimated at between $13 and $15 million, Saunders says, adding it is part of the $110 million construction budget for the entire Coltsville Gateway preservation project.

The public announcement of Insurity’s move — common knowledge amongst commercial real estate brokers for weeks — coincided with an announcement by the state that it is finally ready to make good on its promise to help pay for the environmental cleanup of the Colt site. Last Thursday, Gov. John Rowland said the state is finally recommending that its bond commission release the $4.5 million allocated for the cleanup. In January 2002, the governor’s spokesman explained that the money, pledged by Gov. Rowland in 1999, was on hold because no suitable business plan existed for the property.

Insurity will join the Capital Regional Education Council (CREC) as an anchor tenant in the development. In fact, it was the rapid transformation of CREC’s headquarters that convinced Insurity that the Sawtooth building could be transformed during the agreed-upon timeframe.

“When we first saw the Sawtooth [facility], it was just an old, rundown building,” Glaser says, much like the building that has since become the headquarters for CREC’s special education programs. Today, the CREC building is beautifully restored on the outside but modern and polished on the inside, just as the Sawtooth building will be.

“That’s what really sold us — how quickly they [HFA Holdings] were able to convert the building. That was the deciding factor for us.” He characterizes what HFA Holdings has done with that building as “unbelievable.”

Both Glazer and Saunders are quick to praise the property’s owners, calling them “a committed management team.”

Joel Grieco, senior director at Cushman & Wakefield, who was responsible for brokering the deal, echoes that view. “With these current owners, that place [the Colt property] is moving along. They’re very credible, and they’re very savvy. They just took ownership in January of this year and have already done tremendous things,” he says. “They’re improving the property and taking vital strides toward making it a very attractive place to locate in. It offers tenants a great combination of economical space, close to downtown Hartford, with abundant free parking.”

He characterizes the Colt restoration as an unusual and exciting project. “It won’t fit the parameters of your typical corporate back office user, but for anybody with a desire to be in a very forward-thinking, energetic environment with high ceilings, it’s great.”

Grieco says the Sawtooth location offers Insurity “a good opportunity to get under one roof and onto one floor, which is unusual for a lease of that size. It’s a cool, hip, lively environment that should continue to get better as renovations continue. It’s really going to be a unique space.”

Bob Saunders also credits the design teams, including architect Tai Soo Kim Partners and Maier Design Group LLC, as well as construction manager Bartlett, Brainard and Eacott, for transforming the former gun factory into what is now becoming a viable commercial real estate project.

Insurity’s excitement about its pending move to Coltsville is echoed by city officials. During a press conference to announce the move last week, Hartford Mayor Eddie Perez said the company’s decision to occupy the Sawtooth Building is a sign that the momentum of the Rising Star initiative is building.

“Insurity is a growing company that considered alternatives in the suburbs when planning for its future,” he said, referring to the company’s existing locations and the possibility that it might have chosen to consolidate or expand its operations outside of Hartford. “Instead, after working with our economic development team [HEDC], the company is moving nearly 300 jobs to the city and is playing a key role in our bright future. It is a win for everybody.”

He added that the City of Hartford has made “significant public investments in the success of the entire Colt property. We are happy that [this] investment has leveraged the creation of considerable private economic activity.”

“This is a grand slam project for the city,” Freeman says.

“This is a high-tech tenant that supports a lot of the other companies we have in Hartford — the insurance companies, specifically,” he says. “They are a rapid-growth company, exceeding 20 percent [growth] on a regular basis. They have seen the opportunities that are being presented [here], and they have chosen to stay in the city and grow in the city.”

He adds that the city, along with state and federal governments and Colt’s developers, “have worked very hard to put together a high-quality project that restores the old Colt facility to its original luster. Having Insurity coming into that project shows that the investment of all the parties, and the commitment of all the parties, have been worthwhile.”

Adds Glazer, “We’re excited to be part of the Hartford renaissance.”