Stephen Vlahos, Cameron Doody and Matt Patterson, from left, of Campus Bellhops, work at the Lamp Post Group offices in the Loveman's building in downtown Chattanooga. The Lamp Post Group provides support and helps with funding for entrepreneurs.Growing Chattanooga startup company Bellhops is moving to Warehouse Row as the business strikes out into its own office space.
The moving company, which now offers services in more than 120 markets in 42 states, is relocating from the Lamp Post Group incubator in the Lovemans building downtown to 8,142 square feet a few blocks away in the Row off Market Street.
Bellhops connects customers who are relocating with the manpower they need to help move, logging close to 10,000 moves in this past year alone.
Cameron Doody, Bellhops chairman and co-founder, said the Warehouse Row space is being readied and the company is to move in a couple of months. He said the business has about 40 employees in Chattanooga.
"We made the decision to stay downtown," Doody said. "Chattanooga has been good to us."
Michael Phillips, president of Warehouse Row owner Jamestown, said that startups like Bellhops are at the heart of Chattanooga's growing innovation economy.
"The property's creative lofts, premier office spaces, restaurants and retail offerings have made Warehouse Row a desirable location for the city's downtown workforce," he said in a statement.
Doody said Bellhops is recruiting employees from cities such as San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles and Boston, and Warehouse Row offers "the greatest appeal."
He said that about 80 percent of its employees already live downtown.
"We're very city-focused," Doody said.
He expects Bellhops, which last month announced it has raised $6.1 million from California and New York investors to grow the business, to be close to 75 to 100 employees within two years.
Doody wouldn't provide revenue numbers, but he said sales have grown six-fold in the past year.
Bellhops is an outgrowth of a college campus moving service. It contracts with more than 8,000 trained college students who assist with small- to medium-scale moves across the country.
A team of software engineers automate the company's communications and operations from city to city to ensure a system that allows its contracted bellhops to service customers according to the company's standards.
Bellhops will join four other startup, tech-driven companies located at Warehouse Row, including Signix, Two x Four, Experts Exchange and Coyote Logistics.
Also, national retailers Anthropologie and J. Crew recently opened in the Row. Another full-service restaurant, Two Ten Jack, is slated to open soon.
The Row's retail space is about 90 percent leased, and its office footprint more than three-quarters full.
Atlanta-based Jamestown bought the center in 2006 and has invested about $30 million, including the $14 million sales price. The company has repositioned the eight nearly century-old structures off Market Street to appeal to a more upscale clientele.
Contact Mike Pare at mpare@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6318.