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Snapchat’s physical footprint reveals a core priority of the brand

Vehicles pass in front of a Snapchat Spectacles by Snap Inc. pop-up store in New York, U.S., on Monday, Dec. 5, 2016 (Source: Bloomberg)
Vehicles pass in front of a Snapchat Spectacles by Snap Inc. pop-up store in New York, U.S., on Monday, Dec. 5, 2016 (Source: Bloomberg)

Snap Inc. has had a busy 2017 thus far as it prepares to go public. It added a much needed search bar to its app (making it much more intuitive), went on a hiring spree, and made London its European headquarters, just to name a few recent developments.

CEO Evan Spiegel values having a splashy physical footprint, even though his company’s core product is an app on your phone. Snap has been strategic in choosing office locations that are exposed to tons of pedestrians not only to garner attention but also to get their feedback.

Spiegel originally decided to anchor Snapchat in Venice, Los Angeles’s beachfront neighborhood (after hatching the company in his Stanford dorm room, of course). That move set it apart from tech behemoths like Google (GOOG, GOOGL), Facebook (FB) and Apple (AAPL), which have their campuses in northern California’s Silicon Valley.

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Spiegel said his search for a laid back vibe landed him in LA. While Silicon Valley is known to be a community teeming with tech professionals, southern California is often seen as the breeding ground for creatives.

Before Snapchat outgrew its original headquarters right on Venice Beach (which could have easily been mistaken for a surf shop or a frat house), Spiegel said, in an interview with USA Today in 2013, “Venice has an incredibly rich cultural and creative history. And there’s lots of people. 15 million people walk by Snapchat HQ every single year. That means we can get great product feedback and we can come out and talk to Snapchatters all day long about their experience with the product.”

People take pictures in front of the Snapchat Inc. headquarters on the strand at Venice Beach in Los Angeles, California, U.S., on Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2013. (Source: Bloomberg)
People take pictures in front of the Snapchat Inc. headquarters on the strand at Venice Beach in Los Angeles, California, U.S., on Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2013. (Source: Bloomberg)

In the same interview, Spiegel emphasized that Venice offers a kind of diversity that might not exist in the Valley.

“Venice is a pretty unique location. Not going to make any comments on Silicon Valley; Silicon Valley’s a special place but we think LA has a lot to offer. I grew up here initially but really it’s culturally diverse, there are a lot of people taking on a lot of creative initiatives and activities — that’s really fun, when we’re in a coffee shop hearing about music and movies — that’s enjoyable,” he said.

Snap is often credited for the skyrocketing interest in entrepreneurs deciding to build or expand their businesses into “Silicon Beach.”

Snap currently occupies about 95,000 square feet across Venice, according to real estate data provider CoStar Group. But with its explosive growth, the company has burst into Santa Monica, finding office space in the most unlikely of places, like hangars — yes, the units that typically hold aircrafts.

Last May, Snapchat signed a $3 million-a-year lease swooped into two office buildings and eight hangars, totaling nearly 80,000 square feet.

Similarly, its New York City office (disclosure: it’s located in the same building as Yahoo’s NYC office) is in Times Square where there is no shortage of foot traffic: over 460,000 pedestrians pass through the tourist hot spot on a busy day. This was a deliberate decision over setting up NY shop the Flatiron District, a.k.a. Silicon Alley, which has become the hub of tech and startup culture.

Within New York City, Snap made a splash with its buzzy pop-up store, plastered with its logo, a giant Minion-like eye, on 59th street, right around the corner from 5th avenue and directly next to the flagship Apple store. Talk about optimal product placement — even people who have no interest whatsoever in the company would be curious to take a peek.

Snapchat has taken a 10-year lease in a 12,570 sq ft building, arranged over four floors and has been comprehensively refurbished, on 7-11 Lexington Street in London’s trendy Soho neighborhood. (Source: Edward Charles)
Snapchat has taken a 10-year lease in a 12,570 sq. ft building, arranged over four floors and has been comprehensively refurbished, on 7-11 Lexington Street in London’s trendy Soho neighborhood. (Source: Edward Charles)

Yahoo Finance reached out to Snap Inc. for comment regarding its decision to office location but a spokesperson could not provide any additional statements.

As one of the most highly anticipated public offerings in the last few years, Snap has seriously upped the ante on its public exposure — likely trying to convince investors it’s here to stay.

Melody Hahm is a writer at Yahoo Finance, covering entrepreneurship, technology and real estate. Follow her on Twitter @melodyhahm.

Read more from Melody:
One way Snapchat can evolve to beat back Instagram

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Investor says advertisers lack ‘common sense’ if they ignore Snapchat