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The Park in Berkeley Heights has attracted an impressive roster of tenants as The Connell Co.‘s $500 million effort to transform the office campus into a destination beyond work begins to bear fruit.

Formerly the Connell Corporate Park, the 185-acre site is reemerging as a live-work-play destination in Union County, 30 minutes from New York City. Since gaining approval in 2022, The District at the Park is also currently underway. That project will add five buildings, 328 apartments and 200,000 square feet of restaurant and entertainment retail space to the property. Current features at the walkable campus include a 176-key Embassy Suites Hotel, Lifetime Fitness center, Starbucks, and more than 10 acres of parks and trails.

Even in the evolving market, the more than 1.5 million square feet of office space, flexible areas and collaborative lounges that comprise Round Table Workspaces at The Park are at the center of the property’s transformation. That’s because this isn’t just any office space.

The offering marks the first phase of Round Table Resort, where The Connell Co. is crafting a modern work experience by elevating and incorporating amenities and services that also cater to and serve an individual’s whole lifestyle.

At The Park, the “work resort” concept covers five buildings; three of which are part of Round Table Workspaces (RT 200, RT 300 and RT 500). The 1.5 million square feet of space features a hospitality-driven experience complete with amenity spaces and upgraded finishes as well as white glove services.

Beyond offering a place to work, The Connell Co. Executive Vice President Shane Connell explained that Round Table Resort offers employees an “opportunity to advance their health, education and overall wellbeing.”

The aim is to create a community-centric workspace that rivals urban offerings, thus making it a desirable location for both employees and the public. Currently under construction, various components at The Park are set to open in the next two years.

“Our goal is to basically bring the city to the suburbs … everything you get in New York City is what we’re trying to create here,” Connell told NJBIZ. “We’re trying to create a 20-minute neighborhood where everything you want or need is within a 20-minute walk. The retail and restaurant concepts, outdoor parks, all those type things … we’re bringing to New Jersey and it’s part of that workspace offering.”

As office spaces started taking more inspiration from the hospitality sector, particularly coming out of the pandemic, The Connell Co. decided to go bigger with what it could offer and set that intentionality explicitly by branding the endeavor.

“So, we looked at not just the office space, but also the campus approach — the neighborhood that the office space is in,” Connell said, stressing the importance of the entire package: surroundings, setting and services.

Renovations on Round Table Workspaces began in 2019. The Connell Co. said it invested $100 million to reposition three of the five office buildings to the new RT Workspaces brand.

“Today’s business decision makers want to encourage their employees to return to the office,” Connell said when work began at RT 300 in 2023. “In fact, studies show that one of the primary reasons why many professionals choose to work from the office is to socialize with their coworkers. At The Park, we have intentionally designed every space to help our tenants rebuild social capital among their employees.”

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Mancini Duffy and David M. Sullivan Inc. worked to update the prior corporate aesthetic with a modern experience. That includes adding the 44,000-square-foot Round Table Studios coworking space as well as upgraded fitness, culinary and recreational amenities.

RT Workspaces also offers support via dedicated culinary, hospitality and fitness teams.

[Nearly] no vacancy

So far, the thesis seems to be bearing fruit.

RT Workspaces’ debut comes at a time when premium properties are succeeding in a struggling office market. In 2024, The Connell Co. said it signed 250,000 square feet in leases.

Overall, Roundtable Workspaces boasts a 97% occupancy rate. Tenants including L’Oreal, Fiserv, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Aon and Samsung already call the campus home. Most recently, Blackstone signed on for 39,000 square feet of space at 300 Connell Drive (RT 300).

In its 2024 Third Quarter report on North Jersey, Savills highlighted the deal as one of the top transactions for the quarter. According to The Connell Co., occupancy for Blackstone, the world’s largest alternative asset manager, is set for Q3 2025.

“I think that there’s a lot of trophy space on the market in New Jersey, but it does tend to lease up faster than what we call commodity product, which has not been significantly upgraded in the past five years,” Colliers Research Manager Colin Hyde told NJBIZ in a conversation about the local office sector during the third quarter of 2024.

“We’re seeing a huge differential in terms of vacancy between the spaces that have been substantially upgraded – meaning the landlords put a lot of money into the building over the past five years – versus those that have not,” he said.

According to Connell, office space at The Park in Berkeley Heights has been consistently active over its 40 years of development. “We’ve always had roughly 95% occupancy,” he said.

Fiserv’s 428,000-square-foot building at RT Workspaces houses 3,000 employees, which Connell said are mandatory in-office four out of five days. Meanwhile, L’Oreal occupies a 185,000-square-foot building, with a more flexible schedule.

With HP, Samsung and others in the mix, overall “we’re starting to see the population use go up,” Connell said. According to a cellular tracking metric, he said 9,000 employees use the campus during the week and typically show up for three-and-a-half days.

“I think if you come to our place, you’ll see the parking lots are full every day except, really, Friday. And I think when we have brokers visit us and other companies that are looking to maybe join our campus, that is something that they really express is unusual,” Connell said.

Meeting demand

Even though they don’t represent the majority of what’s available, trophy properties draw a lot of attention.

Within the North and Central New Jersey area, JLL tracks 500 Class A office buildings. According to research from the global real estate and investment management company, 37% of that inventory is defined as “Premier Class A.” Meanwhile, that subset of space boasts the area’s lowest vacancy rates – and highest rents – compared to peers.

JLL defines Premier Class A as assets either constructed in the past 10 years or those significantly improved or renovated during the same time period. Nationally, the North and Central New Jersey Class A market is the third largest, trailing Dallas Fort Worth / Los Angeles, respectively.

As tenants continue to seek modern spaces, and landlords and owners make necessary investments to accommodate changing demands, JLL’s 2024 Northern and Central New Jersey Premier Class A Office Market Update report found the buy-in is paying off.

JLL highlights a 5.9% difference between direct vacancy rates for Premier Class A buildings (20.2%) and their Class A counterparts (26.1%). In the 12-month period covered by the report, four out of the five largest deals involved premier buildings.

For tenants that require a larger footprint, the report predicts these elevated and new work areas will continue to draw demand. During the past year, 65% of leases for 50,000 square feet or more were concentrated in these kinds of buildings, according to the report.

With the market flush with office space, JLL also noted the flight to quality will continue to push tenants to higher quality assets.

For landlords and owners, “The challenge is now, with demand not being quite as high as it was, being able to justify making those upgrades,” without knowing if you can fill the vacancy, Hyde had pointed out.

As for comparative properties to the work resort offering The Connell Co. is rolling out in Berkeley Heights, Connell said he’s seen product across the Hudson River in New York City that aligns similarly with the finishes and amenities offered at The Park.

However, he points out those offerings are defined as “elevated work,” which falls short of what The Connell Co. is looking to put out.

“We’re pushing, I think, a higher-level category is our goal,” he said, where “the service side of it is just important as the design side of it.”

With RT Workspaces, “It’s a work-life balance,” Connell said, adding later, “Really just thinking beyond that, ‘this is a workspace, this is a convenient place that is worth your commute.’”

The concept aims to cater to the needs of both work and life. A mission that comes through in the unique amenities RT Workspaces offers, as well as with the socialization efforts underway – which also invoke a resort atmosphere.

Connell explained, “We’ve added bars within our office buildings. So, there are venue spaces that could be rented for corporate or social events, but then also can be happy hour.”

There’s also a social club that helps to activate these spaces with and for members. Connell said the calendar of events includes game nights, book clubs, a test kitchen, cooking and yoga classes, and more.

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“And it’s not just one company,” he said. “We have 40 different companies on the campus. So you’re intermixing with different employees from different companies. It’s a very social sort of atmosphere.”

Along with elevating the design and infrastructure of the office spaces, other new features include indoor and outdoor collaboration areas, workstations and meeting rooms.

RT Farms feeds tenants, as well as the public, from morning to night, serving up cafe options, packaged meals designed by an in-house nutritionist and culinary team, or grab-and-go fare.

“We have a general manger … just like a hotel. And they’re dealing with onboarding tenants, so they understand all the services — how to use them, how to sign up for them; whether it’s catering or fitness or corporate team building events,” Connell said.

Comprising the culinary team are chefs with fine dining backgrounds. “So, it’s not a cafe, it’s a fine dining restaurant concept that’s in an office building,” Connell explained. He said team members previously worked for restaurateurs and chefs including Steven Starr, Andrew Carmellini, Daniel Meyer and Ang Cooks.

For sweets, the in-house pastry chef held the same title at bakery chain Dean & DeLuca; and there’s an in-house baker. “All our breads in our whole campus are made in-house to support our sandwiches and our restaurant concepts,” Connell said.

“Having the talent level here is part of our offering,” Connell said.

He highlighted the fact that even on the operations side, they’re attracting New York talent. “Bringing the city to the suburbs is our goal,” Connell added.

Each building also features game rooms with recreation options, such as pool tables, ping pong tables and multisport simulators. Aside from fun, The Connell Co. points out the perks also help encourage movement and reinforce the balance between work and life.

RT Workspaces tenants also have access to FIELDHOUSE, a brand-new fitness center with classes, personal training, state-of-the-art equipment, nutrition coaching and locker rooms. Meanwhile, Round Table Studios offers a curated coworking space, featuring community as well as private areas and meeting space.

“Our view is that coworking is an amenity to the workspace — not a separate business,” Connell said.

Particularly as hybrid work arrangements persist post-pandemic, coworking spaces have become crucial to offering tenants and growing companies the flexibility they need.

“I don’t know that you can have a traditional office product without some sort of flexible coworking component and a viable option for large tenants,” he said. “I would say of the 40 companies that are large tenants, at least 20% of them are using or have used our coworking.”

That utilization includes elevated meeting spaces, temporary space while upgrading to a newer office, to get a feel for the campus before entering a long-term commitment, short-term space for space for special teams and more.

“To us, it’s the same product, just different levels of entry,” Connell said.

Tying everything together is Table & Banter. The in-house hospitality team provides homemade, seasonal foods; social activities; and catering and event services for all tenants.

‘Something more’

To develop Round Table Workspaces, Connell said the company really looked at three different products: college and tech campuses as well as traditional resorts.

Taking inspiration from the connectivity, amenities and services that technology companies – like Apple or LinkedIn – offer from their corporate hubs, colleges were crucial because they offered an example of spaces people were eager to return to and engage with post-COVID.

And while resorts are largely about upgrades, they’re also about community – and The Connell Co. hopes to draw out that aspect with its new approach to live-work-play. The ability to socialize, the experience of being on campus – and to entice people to want to participate – is the goal. To hit that, you have to think bigger than just work.

“That’s the thing about resorts, in my mind at least, is that they have a very guest experience that’s a little bit private … but then most of the stuff is available to the public, whether golf courses or spas or gyms or restaurant concepts or venue spaces. So, it’s the same sort of line that we’re using to create this workspace.”

Adopting the resort model allows The Connell Co. to cater to the public, while offering “something more” for tenants. Citing the Highline in Manhattan, Connell said the hope is to create something with similar widespread, public appeal in Union County.

“We’re spending over $40 million just on public parks and they’re anchored by an event plaza, which will have outdoor movies, concerts, farmer’s markets,” he said, emphasizing the importance of public spaces. Plans also include an elevated playground, zip lines, outdoor sports courts and dog parks, he added.

Looking ahead, Connell told NJBIZ there’s about two-to-three more years left in The Connell Co.’s 10-year plan to reposition The Park.

RT 300 and RT 400 are located along District Drive, the forthcoming pedestrian corridor that will run adjacent to The District at The Park. That component is set to include a brewery, covered garden and duckpin bowling nightlife concept, according to The Connell Co. Additionally, all the renovated spaces will be available to book for corporate and team building events or social celebrations.

“So really trying to take away this corporate environment to a mixed-use neighborhood,” Connell said, explaining the thoroughfare will help create a main street connecting those uses within the campus.

In Berkeley Heights, “resort” does not just refer to the kinds of perks available to tenants, but also to the scale at which they are offered.

“We’ve really become a suburban option for people who are traditionally New York City,” Connell said.