NEWARK, Ohio - Dave Longaberger isn't your average CEO. And he didn't want your average corporate headquarters.
That explains why he and the 500 people employed in the Longaberger Co.'s front office now report to work every day in the world's biggest basket.
The $30 million clay-stucco structure - a 180,000-square-foot replica of one of the company's trademark hand-woven market baskets - rises more than seven stories and is crowned by two massive handles.
The building, about 30 miles east of Columbus, is a symbol of success for a family-owned company that reported more than $600 million in basket and pottery sales last year through private home parties.
"It's a piece of pop art. It looks like a picnic basket in the middle of a field. It sure catches your eye," said Dave Dahnke, a senior manager with NBBJ, the Columbus architectural firm that designed the building.
Five years ago, Mr. Longaberger started making plans to build a new headquarters. He knew he wanted something unique but had trouble describing it to the architects he had summoned to his office.
Then he spotted the basket. He grabbed one of the company's products, pulled up its handles and said, "This is what I want. Build it." The job was no picnic.
Like a real Longaberger basket, the building gets wider as it goes up, so each floor had to be designed differently. That adds up to a lot of extra space - the seventh floor has 25,000 square feet compared with 20,000 on the second floor.
The building's 80-foot high handles took 18 months to design and build, project manager Ken Parks said. The handles, which weigh 75 tons apiece, came in 13 pieces that were welded together at the construction site. Each has a special heating unit that prevents ice from forming and falling into a 4,500-square-foot glass ceiling below.
Natural lighting was a problem because the windows could only be placed in the vertical splints of the basket. So architects made the windows as large as possible - 16 feet wide by 6 feet high - and built an atrium that floods the building with light. Lines etched into the glass ceiling cut the glare.
Two 750-pound tags bearing the name "Longaberger" - similar to brass tags found on some of the company's baskets - hang from the sides of the building. Each is plated in 23-karat gold to prevent tarnishing.
Inside, the big basket is decorated with blue and green tiles that match the colors used in Longaberger's decorative-pottery products. Workers like their new corporate home, which replaced the decaying former woolen mill where they had worked for years.
"What could be more fun than to come to work in a basket?" said Jennifer Pearce, the company's director of public relations. Workers don't even mind the stares. The building evokes a strong reaction from passers-by. Some stop to snap pictures, others slow down and gawk.
"Dave said if he built a basket, people would come to see it," Ms. Pearce said.
And what a Longaberger says goes a long way in these parts.
Mr. Longaberger's father, J.W., founded the company about 70 years ago but closed the factory in 1955. In 1972, Dave Longaberger persuaded his father to make a few baskets after he noticed how well imported baskets had begun to sell in stores. The dozen baskets his father produced sold immediately, and Longaberger's went back into business in 1973.
Today, the company's 3,600 employees make about 7 million of the hardwood maple baskets a year at a factory in nearby Dresden. The baskets come in more than 80 different styles in sizes ranging from the small tea basket to the large hamper.
More than 40,000 people across the nation sell the baskets and accessories such as lids and plastic liners at home parties similar to those where Tupperware is sold.
Such exclusivity has created a demand and a devoted following. Baskets sell for $25 to more than $200 new; out-of-production baskets that fetch more than $1,000 are popping up at antiques shows and collectibles shops.
Newark Mayor Frank Stare said he welcomes the attention the basket building is drawing.
"It's going to bring people here to see it just like they go to New York to see the Empire State building," he said. "Someone jokingly made the comment that you'd better hope Longaberger never goes belly up because who would want a building like that."
