BEAUMONT, Texas—Education First Credit Union here has broken ground on a new headquarters building. The project is being overseen by Newground. The new building, a $9.1 million project, will be housed on the same lot on Eastex Freeway as the existing building. The 26,454 square foot, two-story building will hold the offices of several corporate departments and will include space for lending and commercial banking customers to meet with their bankers, according to Newground.
The headquarters of Education First Credit Union has been housed in the same building for more than 30 years, and, with the addition of new personnel to support their steady growth, the CU has outgrown the space. But Education First said it was also looking for a building that would address the changing demands of today’s workforce.
“The influx of digital and mobile technologies has changed the way financial institutions operate day-to-day, as well as the way they recruit employees,” said Steve Clark, VP of Business Development for NewGround.
St. Louis-based NewGround, a design-build firm, said it has seen trends affecting the needs of office spaces nationwide, from increased need for smaller meeting spaces to the demand for flexible integrated technology. “These trends are affecting the ways that employees interact, not only with one another, but also with the space in which they work,” Newground said.
For those reasons, Newground said it has designed a new headquarters that includes a multi-purpose employee lounge and modern collaboration spaces equipped with the latest technology in digital displays. “By creating a space that gives employees what they are looking for in an office, the headquarters can serve as a recruiting and retention tool for Education First Credit Union,” Newground said.
The project is scheduled to be completed in early 2016. For info: www.newground.com.