Burger King’s parent company may be based in Canada now, but the fast food chain is planting its fork in Miami-Dade County long term with plans for a new headquarters building.
Newmark Grubb Knight Frank’s Patrick Duffy and Jon Bourbeau represented Burger King in signing a lease for a 150,000-square-foot building to be constructed in the Waterford at Blue Lagoon office park. The five-story building will be on a five-acre site at 5707 Blue Lagoon Drive.
Burger King is currently in about 200,000 square feet at 5505 Blue Lagoon Drive. So the company is downsizing its space. Burger King completed an $11 billion merger with Tim Hortons in 2015 and its parent company Restaurant Brands International is now based in Toronto, yet it continues to manage its franchise from Miami. It's been in Miami since 1959.
“Given rental inflation in the Miami office market and efficiency gains created in a new building, the cost of moving into a build-to-suit headquarters was less than remaining in an older facility,” Duffy said. “It also allowed Burger King to remain in a single-tenant building that preserves their corporate culture.”
The new building will be on the part of the office park owned by Allianz Real Estate of America and TIAA-CREF, with management by the Hogan Group. The building Burger King is leaving is owned by Franklin Street Properties.Hogan Group VP Stephen Smith said Burger King didn’t need 200,000 square feet and its new corporate culture favors an open, collaborative workplace. For instance, the Tim Horton’s office in Toronto has a huge open floor plate, he said.
“It would be very hard for them to make the existing building work long term,” Smith said. “This is a chance to start from scratch …. It’s good that they are sticking around for the long term.”Burger King's new building should be ready in the third quarter of 2018.
Smith is hoping more companies will favor locating in the business park near Miami International Airport. The Hogan Group is close to breaking ground on 800 Waterford, a 250,000-square-foot speculative “Class A” office building.The Burger King deal was the largest office lease in South Florida during the fourth quarter, according to NGKF. It closed out a productive period for Duffy, who recently brokered lease renewals of 116,000 square feet for Citigroup and 57,764 square feet for Shook Hardy & Bacon at the Miami Center Building at 201 S. Biscayne Blvd. Citigroup downsized from 157,000 square feet.
According to NGKF’s fourth quarter office market report, Miami-Dade had a vacancy rate of 12.9 percent, down from 14.9 percent a year ago. The average asking rent increased to $32.03 per square foot, from $31.80 per square foot. The report found 572,067 square feet of office space under construction, a number that is set to rise.