Oppenheimer 60th Anniversary - 48

Reprinting of From Opportunity to
Legacy: Celebrating the First Fifty Years

<< UP CLOSE

New Digs in Denver
1996 A growing business needs an

infrastructure to support it, and it was
OppenheimerFunds' dramatic growth - and,
perhaps more important, its belief that even
more growth was imminent - that drove
the decision to create a new facility in Denver to house support services. That decision
took an important step toward fruition on
May 3, 1996, when more than 1,000 employees and guests gathered in Denver for a "$50
Billion & Building" celebration. The event
marked not just the achievement of an
important financial milestone, but also the
groundbreaking on the Company's new $20
million Centennial campus.
OppenheimerFunds' rate of growth at
this point was approaching frenetic, as attested by the speed with which the board

of directors approved the plan for a new
Denver facility. Jerry Rutledge, vice president
of facilities, recalled walking out of a board
meeting in 1995 after receiving the green
light to move ahead with the project. "They
approved it before I left the boardroom,
which was absolutely unheard of back then
for a project involving that kind of money,"
he said. Rutledge
recalled turning to
the real estate broker who had helped
him put the proposal together and saying, "My God, now
we have to do it."
By the time the groundbreaking ceremony
took place, preparations were already under way. "We had moved and compacted

OppenheimerFunds' rate of growth at
this point was approaching frenetic.

One of the two new 112,000-square-foot buildings in Denver; with
just 11 months to construct the new buildings, work began immediately
after project approval; during construction 56,000 yards of dirt were
moved or compacted.

48 * OppenheimerFunds: The First Fifty Years

56,000 yards of site dirt and imported
11,000 yards of structural fill," said Rutledge.
He then had just 11 months to build two
112,000-square-foot buildings that would
be the centerpieces of the new Centennial
campus. Following construction, his team
had to move an average of 125 employees
per weekend over 11 straight weekends to

meet lease deadlines. Within a year after
the original construction was complete,
a 70,000-square-foot extension had to be
added to one of the buildings to keep pace
with the Company's growth.
It was a gargantuan effort, to be sure, but
one that was well worth it in the eyes of
those who populated the new facility. When
Rutledge joined the Company in 1983, it had
just 250 people working in Denver; today,
more than 1,600 people work at the Centennial facility. "Prior to moving to the Centennial campus, we had office space in four or
five different locations," said Carol Neverdahl,
a customer service agent in Denver. "It was
inconvenient having to walk back and forth

Oppenheimer 60th Anniversary

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Oppenheimer 60th Anniversary