The Chicago Tribune wrote:Sears Tower name to change to Willis Tower Tribune staff report 9:30 AM CDT, March 12, 2009
Sears Tower will change its name to Willis Tower under the terms of a new lease signed by global insurance broker Willis Group Holdings.
Willis Group plans to consolidate five area offices and move nearly 500 Associates into Willis Tower, at 233 S. Wacker, initially occupying more than 140,000 square feet on multiple floors.
London-based Willis said its move to the new space, at $14.50 per square foot, will result in significant real estate cost savings, and that there is no additional cost to the company associated with renaming the building.
"Having our name associated with Chicago's most iconic structure underscores our commitment to this great city, and recognizes Chicago's importance as a major financial hub and international business center," said Joseph J. Plumeri, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Willis Group Holdings.
Sears, Roebuck & Co., now based in Hoffman Estates, finished construction on the office building in 1973 but has not had offices in it since 1992. At the time it was the tallest building in the world. Now, it is the tallest in the Western Hemisphere.
Wow, with the whole Macy-Field's fiasco (that is still biting them in the ass), you'd think they would be smarter than to change the name of a world-famous Chicago landmark.
This is ridiculous. When Galvan told me about it, I couldn't believe it. I had also said that Willis Tower doesn't sound right, at all, and we're too used to Sears Tower. Come on now. The name is fine the way it is, who really cares if it hasn't had offices in it since 1992? It started out with Sears offices, or whatever, and that's how it got its name, and that's how it shall stay. Leave it the heck alone.
In February 2009 the owners announced they are considering a plan to paint the structure silver. The paint would "rebrand" the building and highlight its advances in energy efficiency. The estimated cost is $50 million
yeah, I heard about the silver thing last month when it was announced, though that announcement was kept sorta on the down low which makes me think it's still in the conception stage and probably wont happen when they realize how retarded it'd look. After all, the city can barely keep busses running and are laying off people left and right, and they are going to let some company spend 50 million bucks, which of course they will ask the city for some of that money just to paint a building that doesn't need it. On top of that Sears Tower has gold plated windows, if they leave them it's going to look even more incredibly stupid or they are going to have to replace them all, which I cant imagine is included in that 50 mil.
The name though, I know Sears hasn't paid a dime in years to keep it named the Sears Tower, but Willis isn't paying either, I guess it's sorta of a perk of occupying the tower. If you are going to change the name of a worldwide icon, they really should make quite a lot of money off of it. Now all it's going to do is piss off 97% of the people in Chicago, according to a text poll they did on the WGN noon news where they asked if they should change the name and results were 97% no. It seems retarded but it's not like anyone is actually going to use the new name for at least a decade. Sorta like the Rosemont Horizon, no one called it Allstate Arena for a long time, basically until a new generation learned it by it's new name, and it still sounds weird to me.
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I really don't understand the big deal about the name change. I've always questioned why people go nuts over it. It's one thing if people get angry if the place changes everything (such as a local burger place becoming Chinese takeout) but the name? To me, it's just a name. The older generation will call it by it's old name, the in-the-middle might make the switch and the new generation will never know anything is wrong. I remember when the WWF became the WWE. Yeah it was odd and annoying to remember to say the right name, but things move forward.
From what I hear, Willis wont even be the dominant occupant, and they're just buying the upper floors. Maybe an added perk for making a large purchase in this economy?
We Chicagoans don't take kindly to change, haha. So, when they propose calling our beloved and iconic Sears Tower the Willis Tower, we get angry. Will we do anything about it? No. We're too busy grumbling about our ridiculous tax rate...that we have yet to do anything about.
I'm not angry about the name change, but I'd never call it by it's new name. It's always been the Sears Tower, and old habits die hard. I'm not even a big baseball fan and I still call the place where the White Sox play Comiskey Park. I currently live in Milwaukee and it took a few days before I found out about the name change, so if anyone had actually referred to it as Willis Tower before I found out, I would have had no idea what they were talking about. On that note, no one will call it Willis Tower, and anyone who does will be met with confused looks.
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