Amazon company leases old North Charleston city hall

Amazon is expanding in North Charleston.

The city of North Charleston leased the old city hall building to CreateSpace, a DBA of On-Demand Publishing LLC, part of the Amazon group of companies.

“Leasing the former city hall for the expansion of CreateSpace is certainly terrific news for the city of North Charleston with the added benefits of jobs and an investment that will resound throughout the region,” Mayor Keith Summey said. “We look forward to a long-lasting relationship with CreateSpace and remain committed to being a business-friendly community.”

The company leases an office at 7290 Investment Drive. The city hall building offers 59,643 of rentable square feet.
“We’ll be moving some of our current employees to the building in the coming months, and also retaining the lease for our current building,” said David Symonds of CreateSpace.

CreateSpace will pay $793,251 in rent for their first year. Terms of the lease stipulate an escalator increase of 2.5% annually for five years. The company also has two options to renew their lease in five-year increments with additional escalators.

North Charleston is investing $2.5 million to upfit the building for CreateSpace’s needs.

Summey’s office said the renovations would have been required for any tenant, and include updating sprinkler systems and bringing the old building up to current code.

Summey said in an interview Monday he expects the expansion could add 200 jobs initially, and an eventual job total of 350 jobs.

Rumors of Amazon’s expansion started when the North Charleston City Council approved severing an old lease on the building and approving a lease to a company then-referred to as “Project X.”

Amazon confirmed the rumors via written statement today.

“As a Charleston business for over 12 years, we look forward to furthering our investment in the community,” Symonds said.

CreateSpace originally began as Great Unpublished, an on-demand book publisher started in 2000. The company, which later became BookSurge, was purchased by Amazon in 2005.

Reach Lauren Ratcliffe at 843-849-3119.