Holmes Murphy announces plans to expand into West Des Moines’ Arcadia building

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Holmes Murphy & Associates has signed a lease and will expand into the newly renovated Arcadia building in West Des Moines.

The move was necessary to accommodate the insurance broker’s growth, and it will occupy about 75,000 square feet in the building at 7000 Vista Drive, joining ITA Group as a tenant.

Holmes Murphy can no longer sustain its “substantial growth” in its Waukee office, and the expansion into the Arcadia building will allow the company to continue to “recruit and retain the best employees in the business,” Holmes Murphy CEO Dan Keough said in a news release.

“We knew we needed to strategically think about the next step for our future,” he said. “We explored all options and ultimately made the decision to lease a second space in the Des Moines metro.”

The 270,000-square-foot Arcadia building was built in 1993 and was home to Wells Fargo’s credit card servicing division until 2023. R&R Realty Group renovated the four-story building, changing the color of its exterior, installing a giant video board inside the front entrance and transforming a parking lot on the building’s south side into a park-like setting that features walking trails, pickleball courts, a putting green and gathering spaces. R&R also contracted with New Horizon Academy to provide on-site day care.

“The building has amenities and features that fit our culture and unique aesthetic vibe, areas to collaborate and connect, additional meeting and training rooms, and added room for employees to work more efficiently and effectively without space constraints,” Keough said in the release.

HMA Group Holdings LLC, a subsidiary of Holmes Murphy, was awarded $413,900 in tax credits through the High Quality Jobs program from the Iowa Economic Development Authority in December for the expansion.

The company will relocate 100 employees from its Waukee office to the newly renovated West Des Moines site.

The expansion will allow Holmes Murphy to create 212 jobs that pay a qualifying wage of $36.80 per hour.

The project is estimated to cost $10.6 million.

Holmes Murphy’s office at 2727 Grand Prairie Parkway in Waukee will remain its headquarters, and the expansion into the Arcadia building will help guide the company’s growth for several years, Keough said.

“We are simply growing at a pace that exceeds our ability to match it within the space we have now,” he said. “Having an additional location will allow for our Waukee headquarters to be used in the manner in which we had always intended — to be open and spacious and to have several collaboration areas in which our employees can truly connect and do their best work.”

Tom Stewart, a spokesman for the company and president of PLUS Holmes Murphy, said the company expects to run out of room at its Waukee office, where it employs about 550 people, by 2028 and needed “some cushion” as it plans for the future.

“This gives us time to figure out what we really want to do from a footprint in Waukee,” he said. “It allows us to provide the best employee experience possible.”

The company employs about 1,200 people across 16 offices, not including the Arcadia building.

The move is all part of the company’s long-term growth vision, Stewart said.

Holmes Murphy owns 5 acres of land adjacent to its Waukee office, and that could come into play as the company develops its strategy for growth, he said.

“We’re going into our 2030 planning sessions, so we’ll be talking about what we want to do. Do we want everybody under one roof like we have here in Waukee? Do we mind having multiple locations? That’s what we’re talking about right now,”  he said.

Stewart would not specify the length of lease Holmes Murphy signed with R&R Realty but said “depending on our growth and the people we’re sending over there, we could see staying there a very long time.”

Holmes Murphy plans to move some of its staff into the Arcadia building this fall.

Until then, the company is working with a contractor and R&R on tenant improvements, Stewart said.

He said the Arcadia building location — just 3 miles from the company’s Waukee office — and its amenities made it a smart choice for Holmes Murphy.

“We’re so proud of our Waukee space that we wanted anyone being relocated to Arcadia to feel like it was as good, if not better, than our Waukee space,” Stewart said.

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Michael Crumb

Michael Crumb is a senior staff writer at Business Record. He covers real estate and development and transportation.

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