![]() ![]() "Naming rights are an asset of the building. The London-based Willis Group Holdings got the naming rights as part of its lease agreement with the real estate investment group that owns Sears Tower. The bottom shows the granite marker outside the building covered in black in preparation for the building's name being changed to Willis Tower during a formal ceremony on Thursday, July 16. This combo of photos from March 12, 2009, top, and Monday, July 13, 2009, show pedestrians walking past the Sears Tower in Chicago. Historically, skyscrapers have been businesses unto themselves, acting as a commodity to compete for high rents and tenants, said Carol Willis, founder and director of The Skyscraper Museum in New York. "If we're good corporate citizens and do what we should, hopefully Willis and the tower and Chicago will all become synonymous." For the generation that grew up calling it the Sears Tower, it'll be hard for people to shift and start calling it something else."Everybody knows that tower," Willis Group Holdings chief executive Joe Plumeri said ahead of Thursday's ceremony. Several local residents have expressed their displeasure in the renaming, including one who started the website Chicago Historical Society senior curator John Russick has stated of the name change, "The Sears Tower has been an icon here for the last quarter of a century. The renaming has received some criticism from columnists in local papers, such as the Chicago Tribune, as Willis has almost no name recognition in the Chicago area. The tourist areas to the building, which includes a 103rd floor observation deck, will retain its current name, Skydeck Chicago. The date and time name change was kept quiet until the actual lettering was changed, though the change was anticipated for several months. Though lettering on the building had been changed on July 15, the official change did not occur until July 16, during a private ceremony involving 500 Willis employees and invited guests. They are leasing 140,000 square feet of the building at a rate of $14.50 per square foot, and are consolidating their five Chicago-area offices to the new space. Willis Group Holdings is a London-based insurance company, incorporated in Bermuda. The naming rights did not cost Willis any additional money, and they will retain those rights until at least 2024. Since no deal had been worked out to rename the building by that date, it retained the Sears Tower name until Willis Group Holdings negotiated the naming rights as part of their lease on the building. However, they retained the naming rights until 2003. Sears had mostly moved out of the building by 1992, and closed its last offices there by 1995. ![]() It is currently owned by American Landmark Properties of Skokie, Illinois. Sears, Roebuck and Company owned the building from its conception until it sold it in 1994. Willis Tower in Chicago, formerly the Sears Tower. It is the largest skyscraper in the United States and was for a time the largest skyscraper in the world though it has since been surpassed. As part of the deal whereby they agreed to lease 140,000 square feet of the building, they were given the naming rights to the tower, which had been known as the Sears Tower since its opening in 1973. Willis Group Holdings became a major tenant of the building in March, 2009. On July 16, 2009, the largest skyscraper in Chicago, Illinois was officially renamed Willis Tower. ![]()
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