Brokered Loyalty

Brokered Loyalty

COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE by Dave Szymanski | Tampa Bay Editor

CLW Real Estate Services Group in Tampa pledges to spend most of its time helping existing clients to grow rather than mining for new ones.

They bring decades of commercial real estate experience to the table on the Gulf Coast.

With well-known names and contacts, they seem capable of attracting a constant stream of new business.

But they say that's not their mission.

Instead, Doug Rothschild, 48, and Lou Varsames, 47, principals of Tampa-based CLW Real Estate Services Group, focus on growing existing clients. Varsames says in that respect, 20-year-old CLW is more like a law firm than a commercial real estate brokerage.

"Our culture is not to focus on the business we don't have, but the clients we have," Rothschild says. "Typically, a brokerage is cold calling to get new business. We try to grow with our clients. We do get new business. But we mainly grow our existing clients. We grow our territory."

Prior to CLW, Rothschild worked as a broker with CB Richard Ellis in Tampa for 14 years.

Varsames came to Tampa in 1985 with Towermarc Development Corp. and built the Benjamin Center, an industrial development across the road from the Thompson Center in the Tampa International Airport area. In 1991, he joined CLW.

Varsames hired Rothschild to list and lease the Powerplace building on Westshore Boulevard. Varsames then recruited Rothschild to join him at CLW in 1995. In the last few years, both became owners of the firm.

Their strategy: Focus on a select group of clients and build a veteran team. It has accomplished both.

The average CLW employee has 19 years in the industry. Versames and Rothschild each have 27 years in commercial real estate.

"We've done this in a careful way, recruiting and retaining this all-star team," Rothschild says.

Some of the hires included Joe Taggert, formerly of Crescent Resources; Terri Huerta, an office broker; Jeff Bardin, who has more than 20 years in the industry and is focused on industrial work; Barry Hannerfield, formerly an executive with The Wilson Co. in Tampa; and developer Ross Kirk.

National clients

Part of the reason CLW can work closely with existing clients is because it has some solid accounts. Besides local work, the firm does national work for a dozen national firms including Liberty Mutual, EMC, PriceWaterhouseCoopers, GameFly and Diageo, the biggest liquor distributor in world.

That approach earns respect from Gulf Coast competitors, some who follow the same client loyalty strategy and also have veteran brokers in their stables.

"It's what all good companies do," says Ray Sandelli, senior managing director of CBRE in Tampa. "We spend a lot of time with existing clients. That's your best recommendation: Speak to our current clients. We want to make sure they are satisfied."

The nature of land brokerage is a little different than leasing office or industrial space because of individual land owners, but working with existing, proven developers makes good economic sense, says Bill Eshenbaugh, CEO of the Eshenbaugh Land Co. in Tampa. Proven clients get land deals done. Consistently.

"I'm constantly looking for new business, but our No. 1 priority is taking care of existing clients," Eshenbaugh says. "Loyalty counts."

No handoffs

Although it works with other brokerages when clients need help with multiple locations out of town, CLW pledges not to hand off a client to a another person at its own firm.

"If I'm the account manager and I'm in Tupelo, Miss., PriceWaterhouse only sees me, even though we'll also use a local broker in Tupelo," Rothschild says. "That's for consistency."

CLW began in Tampa in 1988. It now has offices in Hartford, Conn.; Atlanta; Phoenix and Tampa. The majority of its 85 employees, or about 75, are in Tampa.

In last six months, it's been successful in buying more than $220 million in real estate, both commercial and industrial. Among its Tampa properties are the 500,000-square-foot Benjamin Road industrial buildings.

"We've not only bought property, but we've bulked up our property management and landlord-leasing business," Varsames says. CLW has more than 1 million square feet of properties it is managing.

And it plans to continue to buy investment properties. It is getting ready to announce a new industrial project in eastern Hillsborough County.

"We've been so busy," Rothschild says. "We haven't been talking about ourselves."

Indeed, its Web site refers to itself as "the quiet company," although its projects haven't all been silent or nondescript.

Among its managed properties is the green-peaked 100 N. Tampa Building in Tampa, downtown's tallest office tower, and Waterford Plaza on Rocky Point. CLW secured 172,000 square feet of office space for Tampa-based Outback Steakhouse.

But like Outback, its reach goes far beyond Tampa. Varsames, an economics major at Harvard, recently secured a 30-year equity lease for 800,000 square feet of office space in New York valued at $2.2 billion.

Its projects also include 29,000 square feet of office space for Hartford Insurance in Reno, Nev.; 10,070 square feet for ING Financial in Scottsdale, Ariz.; and 234,000 square feet for Diageo in Sonoma, Calif.

Project management

CLW created a business group within the company to manage commercial real estate projects for clients. It can manage the build-out of space, hire architects and helps clients manage budgets and schedules.

It also created CLW Healthcare Services Group, which specializes in selling senior housing communities.

"We try to be vertically integrated for multi-level service," Varsames says.

Although Rothschild, a Chicago native, and Varsames could've moved CLW to Atlanta, Boston or New York, they are happy to stay where their careers brought them.

"In today's world, a company can be anywhere," Rothschild says. "We're across street from a great airport. We are in a great location."

Revenue is around $20 million. The past five years, annual revenue growth has tracked about 20%. As for this year, it is harder to estimate.

"It is an unusual time, with the elections," Rothschild says. "What we have found, regardless of economic times, corporations have to make real estate decisions."

The tougher economy actually may work in its favor.

"When times are tough, we are called in even more," Rothschild says. "Corporations have other issues to deal with. They hire us to deal with the real estate portion of it."

REVIEW SUMMARY

Company: CLW Real Estate Services Group in Tampa

Industry: Commercial real estate

Key: Helping existing clients grow.