Wisconsin Companies Rethinking How They Invest in Workspaces

Thursday, January 19th, 2023 -- 10:01 AM

(By Joe Schulz, Wisconsin Public Radio) While workers are slowly returning to the office after the pandemic forced many to work from home, companies are rethinking how they invest in their workspaces.

According to Joe Schulz with Wisconsin Public Radio, since the COVID-19 pandemic, many of the jobs that were traditionally done in a physical office space have been done remotely. And while there are no longer pandemic restrictions limiting the ability to gather at work, many people have continued to work from home.

"We don't believe that's going anywhere," said S.R. Mills, chief executive officer of Bear Real Estate Group, a Kenosha-based developer that owns and manages real estate in Wisconsin and 13 other states. "We think that will continue — (though) certainly not to the same degree as it was during the pandemic."

The shift toward remote work has changed commercial development.  In downtown Madison for example, only two of the over 70 current, recently completed and planned development projects were offices, according to the Downtown Madison Development Tracker website.

Meanwhile, in the Milwaukee area, 73 out of 93 office leases from January through March 2022 were in the suburbs instead of the downtown area, according to Milwaukee Business Journal.

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