Environ nearly doubles size of Newark office

The firm is preparing for a move that will place it in the more than 8,000 square feet in Matrix Development‘s The Legal Center.NEWARK — Next Friday, environmental consulting firm Environ will relocate its office in the state’s largest city from One Gateway Center to The Legal Center, just across the street.

The firm has leased 8,235 square feet of Class A office space on the seventh floor of the Matrix Development Group-owned building, nearly double the size of the approximately 4,500 square feet of Class A office space it occupies at Advance Realty Corp.’s One Gateway.

Environ is looking to hire more people in its Newark office because of the city’s proximity to New York, as well as the city’s rail access, which facilitates travel to the company’s other U.S. locations, such as Arlington, Va., and Baltimore, according to Robert Bull, executive managing director at Studley, which represented the firm in the deal.

Staying at One Gateway “would have been their first choice, because they’re on the 23rd floor with great views,” Bull said. But given the building’s low vacancy, their space requirements could not be accommodated on one floor, he said.

Environ decided to lease at The Legal Center partly because of the firm’s relationship with Matrix, a long-term client, and also because its new space previously belonged to a law firm, according to Bull. “They’re able to take advantage of a lot of nice finishes and upgrades that they normally wouldn’t have spent the money to do,” he said.

But the company may be scaling back somewhat on its expansion plans, given challenging economic conditions, he said. In September, “when they signed the lease, their business was doing very, very well, and they anticipated the growth,” Bull said.

Environ is still doing well, but will now likely take longer to expand into its new space, he said. “They’re not focusing on growth so as much as they’re just focusing on doing the best they can with what’s going on in the marketplace right now,” Bull said.