Securian Financial is making a very visible bet on downtown St. Paul, putting $50 million into a sweeping renovation of its headquarters campus. The company is updating roughly 1 million square feet of office space, from work floors to common areas, in a move meant to modernize its footprint and signal that it is sticking around for the long haul.
The investment is part of a broader refresh of the Securian Center, which covers about a million square feet across two towers. Securian has about 2,300 employees and expects staff to be in the office at least three days a week, according to the Pioneer Press.
New gym and workplace perks
The flashiest piece of the overhaul is a roughly 13,000-square-foot fitness and wellness center that opened with more than 3,000 members already signed up. The facility mixes old-school sweat with high-tech touches, featuring computer-assisted treadmills, pickleball courts, bike storage, hydro-beds, and a cryolounge cold-therapy chair. “I think we’ve knocked it out of the park,” Laura Magnuson said, while Kristi Fox added that the work “reflects who we are” during a ribbon-cutting, per the Pioneer Press.
Part of a broader downtown rebound
City leaders are folding Securian’s project into a much larger push to revive the core of Minnesota’s capital. Altogether, they say more than $1 billion in public and private investment is lined up for downtown Saint Paul. At its May meeting, the Saint Paul Downtown Alliance detailed that estimate, including roughly $250 million targeted for housing and hundreds of millions more for roads and parks, and noted that Securian and the Bush Foundation helped seed a $30 million downtown investment fund, as reported by the Star Tribune.
Securian's strategy: sustainability and hybrid work
Inside Securian, the renovation is framed as part of its On the Move initiative, a multi-year effort to right-size office space, lease out surplus floors to other tenants and shrink the campus’s environmental footprint. The company notes that the 401 building is LEED Gold certified and that both towers carry strong ENERGY STAR ratings, positioning the headquarters as more efficient and better suited to hybrid schedules, according to Securian Financial.
Buildings and scale
The campus is anchored by the 21-story 400 Robert tower, built in 1982, and the 13-story 401 Robert building, completed around 2000, according to commercial property records. Those listings show the two towers make up the bulk of Securian’s downtown footprint as the company refits floors to match post-pandemic office demand, per PropertyShark.
What comes next
Company executives and civic leaders are betting that upgraded space and amenities will help pull more workers back into downtown, support street-level retail and keep the office towers competitive for future tenants. “Together, these efforts are driving a record‑breaking $1 billion in downtown investment and powering downtown Saint Paul’s next chapter,” Saint Paul Downtown Alliance president Joe Spencer said in a release.
