Crews start transforming former Post-Standard building into VIP HQ

Dave Nutting, executive chair of VIP Development Associates, on Oct. 22 addressed a gathering inside the Post (the former Post-Standard building) at 101 N. Salina St. in Syracuse. VIP bought the building in 2017 and is renovating the structure to serve as its new headquarters with room for tenants. (ERIC REINHARDT / CNYBJ)

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Work is underway on the former Post-Standard building at 101 N. Salina St. in Syracuse, which will soon become the new headquarters for VIP Development Associates, the development arm of VIP Structures. Moving forward, the facility is now known as the Post, VIP revealed during an Oct. 22 event inside the building. […]

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SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Work is underway on the former Post-Standard building at 101 N. Salina St. in Syracuse, which will soon become the new headquarters for VIP Development Associates, the development arm of VIP Structures.

Moving forward, the facility is now known as the Post, VIP revealed during an Oct. 22 event inside the building. VIP Structures, a national design-build firm, currently operates at 1 Websters Landing in Syracuse.

“The decision to purchase the Post-Standard [building] in 2017 felt deeply personal, not only to be able to expand VIP Structures and our current footprint in the city but to give back to the city that welcomed me,” Dave Nutting, a Massachusetts native and executive chair of VIP Development Associates, said in his remarks. Nutting founded VIP Structures in 1975, and since that time the company has grown to include architecture and construction, development, and engineering. It has 130 employees.

VIP Structures paid $4 million for the building, according to the website of the Onondaga County Office of Real Property Tax Services. The overall project will cost $20 million, the company tells CNYBJ.

Sub-contractors on the project will include Century Heating + Cooling of DeWitt, which handles maintenance and service of heating, ventilation, and air conditioning; Phoenix Electric of CNY, Inc. an electrical contractor in DeWitt; and Burns Bros Contractors of Syracuse, a mechanical contractor. 

“Moving to the Post gives us the opportunity to have all of our operating entities on one single floor plate … increasing our efficiencies and enabling the collaboration and innovation necessary to solve our clients’ greatest space needs,” Meg Tidd, CEO of VIP Structures, said in her remarks. 

Besides VIP Structures, Chase Design will also be a tenant in the building. VIP has worked with Chase Design, which has been a VIP tenant in Skaneateles. 

Chase Design employs more than 100 people between offices in Skaneateles and Cincinnati, Ohio. 

“We’re real excited … to kind of start a new chapter and come back home to Syracuse,” Joe Lampertius, president of Chase Design, said in his comments at the Oct. 22 event.

Dave Chase launched Chase Design in Syracuse in 1957 and decided to move the business to Skaneateles a few years later, according to Lampertius. 

In addition, Advance Media will lease the remaining square footage of the existing building to continue printing the Post-Standard, VIP said.

VIP Structures will occupy a 25,000-square-foot space on the building’s first floor, Charlie Wallace, Jr., president of development, tells CNYBJ. The second floor has about 51,000 square feet of additional office space on the second floor. Chase Design is taking 40,000 square feet of the second-floor space, leaving about 11,000 of additional office space available for lease, according to Wallace.

“The building will be occupied in April on these floors and in October in our space down below, so things are moving along quickly,” said Nutting. 

“We cannot wait to experience the festivals in Clinton Square; invite folks to our common area café; and just be that much closer to the heart of it all,” Tidd said.         

Eric Reinhardt: