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Chase Center: Bayside Bonanza

Big numbers and bold design put the new home of the Warriors on ground few can tread

Chase Center becomes the second major sports tenant in Mission Bay, where the San Francisco Giants have been playing just to the north since 2000.Jason O’Rear / Chase Center

The $1.6 billion Chase Center sets new standards for arena development, from the jaw-dropping revenue it will generate to the adjacent development that will make it far more than the shiny new home for the Golden State Warriors.

The arena was designed to showcase the Warriors for 41 regular-season home games and to host more than 200 events per year, but will use its vast commercial and retail component to operate as a 365-day San Francisco attraction.

The project includes three acres of public and plaza space with art installations and plans for more than 20 restaurants and retail locations that make up some 100,000 square feet of retail space in the surrounding district the team calls Thrive City. Two office towers, built in a partnership between the Warriors and Uber, will open next year and add 580,000 square feet of office space, representing a critical revenue stream for the 100 percent privately funded complex. 

While newer projects such as Fiserv Forum that opened last year in Milwaukee also include commercial projects built around them, the Chase Center adds greater scale to the  work and play concept that increasingly is tied into new sports facilities.

Chase Center

Tenant: Golden State Warriors
Owner: Golden State Warriors
Architects: Manica, Gensler and Kendall Heaton Associates 
Builder: Mortenson Clark Joint Venture 
Mechanical/Electrical: Smith Seckman Reid
Structural: Magnusson Klemencic Associates
Project manager: CAA Icon
Lighting: First Circle and Sean O’Connor Lighting
Concessions: Management partnership with the Warriors, Bon Appetit and Levy Restaurants
Team store operator: Fanatics 
Video board: Samsung Electronics America
Naming-rights partner: JPMorgan Chase 
Founding partners: Accenture, Adobe, Google Cloud, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Kaiser Permanente, Oracle, PepsiCo, Rakuten, RingCentral, Ticketmaster, United Airlines and Verizon
Branded spaces: Courtside Lounges East — Accenture; Courtside Lounges West — Google Cloud; Sideline Club — United Airlines; Sideline Club — Budweiser; Courtside Club — Chase; Floor Seat Club — JPMorgan; End Zone Bar — Pepsi; suite level — Oracle; Theater Boxes — Tanduay Rum; Modelo Cantina — upper-level restaurant and bar with views into the bowl that is accessible for all fans

“Over the course of the season, you will see a very different fan experience when you are attending an event at the Chase Center,” said Rick Welts, president and chief operating officer of the Warriors. “There is activation of the public spaces in a way to make it a destination not only for a sports event. You can plan a day around it.”

Unique to the project is that it is the only completely privately-funded arena in the NBA. The development was fueled by the success of the Warriors, who have made the NBA Finals in each of the past five seasons while winning three championships in the economically vibrant Silicon Valley market.

“It’s the one big point of differentiation,” Welts said of the private financing. “We got very lucky with the timing. We did this in San Francisco in the midst of an economic boom that is unprecedented. We’ve had amazing winds at our back to make this happen.”

The Chase Center is a cash cow on its own, opening with a record $2 billion in contractually obligated income from suite sales, sponsorships and other premium product revenue. Top suites cost $2.25 million a year, the high-end cost for eight of 32 courtside lounges. The low end is $1.3 million annually for the courtside suites. Separately, the Warriors sold 44 mid-level suites for about $1 million a year, and 60 theater boxes ranging from $350,000 to $525,000 per year.

“The whole reason for building this is to set the tone for the Warriors to compete for championships, and by having that long-term commitment from sponsors and suite holders is an indication that we had the right formula,” Welts said. “This is one of the few places in the U.S. that could support the level of premium that we created.”  

The team also points to its unique approach to food and beverage that features a partnership between Chicago-based Levy, which has had a deal with the team since 2004, and Palo Alto-based Bon Appetit Management Co. Levy brings in years of hospitality industry experience while Bon Appetit adds local culinary expertise. The arena has nearly 40 locations to purchase food and beverages.

By the numbers

 

$1.6 billion

Cost to build

18,064

Seating capacity

9,699 square feet

Size of LED space on video board, the largest in the NBA

200

Events per year

10,000 square feet

Size of the Warriors Shop at Thrive City

“It’s a game changer because it takes the best of both companies,” said Kim Stone, general manager of the Chase Center. “That is new and different.”

The Warriors also partnered with Square to handle point of sale transactions, which Stone said changes the traditional method of payments within the arena and provides key data. “We immediately know about purchase value and what items are going,” she said.  

Back-of-the-house aspects of the Chase Center leave nothing to distract from the clean, modern design. For example, the arena’s loading areas were carefully planned with the docks built below grade in order to be unseen from the outside.

Chase Center gold rush

 

$2 billion

Contractually obligated revenue

$300 million-$400 million

Estimated value of naming-rights deal with Chase

$2.25 million

Annual cost for one of the best courtside lounges

$350,000+

Annual cost of theater boxes

“There is no ugly backside of other arenas,” Welts said. “Everything disappears under street level.”

Inside, the rigging system allows for faster and more direct load-ins for concerts. The massive center-hung scoreboard, the largest in the NBA, can be easily tucked into the arena ceiling during concerts or other events.

While the arena, which seats 18,064 for basketball, is complete and ready for its busy programming schedule, the overall Chase Center development will continue. Plans call for a theater concept to seat between 2,000 and 5,000 to open next year inside the arena. A hotel is expected to be added over the next few years, as well as other yet undisclosed features.

“To go from being a tenant in a building to owning, operating and programming the whole facility ourselves has been a heavy lift,” Welts said. “As we figure it out, it will also give us reasons to start exploring other things that we see as interesting.”  

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