Suburban Milwaukee business executives are finding the energy and vibrancy of downtown Milwaukee as major draws to move their firms to the city's central business district. That was the consensus of panelists at the Milwaukee Business Journal's recent Downtown Milwaukee Renaissance event.
Check out the attached slideshow to see photos of the panel and those who attended the event, which was held at The Pfister Hotel.
This was the second straight year we have held the "Renaissance" event and it is clear that the momentum in downtown Milwaukee is continuing. All one has to do is look at all the construction cranes in the downtown area building more than $3 billion in new development including the $450 million Northwestern Mutual corporate headquarters and the $500 million new arena for the Milwaukee Bucks.
The panel included Greg Nickerson, CEO of Bader Rutter, whose firm is moving from Brookfield to the former Laacke & Joy building on North Water Street; Brad Zepecki, managing partner of SafeNet Consulting, whose firm moved from Wauwatosa to the Pabst Professional Building earlier this year, and David Raysich, managing partner of Plunkett Raysich Architects LLP, whose architecture firm moved from Milwaukee's northwest side to the Walker's Point neighborhood.
Stewart Wangard, CEO of Wangard Partners, and Linda Gorens-Levey, partner in General Capital Group and co-chair of the Greater Milwaukee Committee's Downtown Task Force, were on the panel and provided perspective on why suburban firms were making the move.
"We felt the experience our employees would have being in a downtown location would be superior to the suburbs," Nickerson said. "The energy and the vibrancy you get in a downtown location cannot be replicated in a suburban location.”
Milwaukee-area business executives in attendance included Kevin Anderson of Old National Bank, John Kersey of Zilber Ltd., Scott Welsh of Colliers International Wisconsin, Dave Anderson of BMO Harris Bank and Joel Brennan of Discovery World.
Click on the headline below to read the first story from the event. Watch for extensive coverage from the Downtown Milwaukee Renaissance event on our website this week and in our Sept. 23 print issue.
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