Cornerstone’s busy corner

Cornerstone Bank sets up shop at what’s likely to be one of Sioux Falls’ highest-trafficked intersections

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. – Eighty thousand. Two hundred thousand.

When it comes to Cornerstone Bank’s new office building here, those numbers explain it all, said Evan Ingebrigtson, market president with the bank in Sioux Falls.

“In the early 1980s in Sioux Falls, we sat at a population of about 75,000 or 80,000 people,” Ingebrigtson said.

“Today, we are close to 200,000 just in the footprint of Sioux Falls. And if you involve the whole metro area, it’s more like a quarter-million.

“That’s phenomenal,” he noted. And it’s why Cornerstone Bank, which has 10 locations around North Dakota, expanded to Sioux Falls and in December, opened its new two-story, 16,000-square-foot branch office building there.

Here’s another number, this one helping to explain the new building’s specific location: 30,000.

That’s the 2018 traffic count on South Louise Avenue past its intersection with West 69th Street, the corner that now hosts Cornerstone Bank’s new building.

But not only is that 2018 traffic count already up 25 percent from 2014, it’s poised to at least double within a few more years. That’s because 69th and Louise is the heart of one of the fastest-growing areas in the state -- one that includes Avera on Louise, the $172 million Avera Health campus that’ll open later this year.

Avera on Louise, by the way, is located kitty-corner from the new Cornerstone Bank.

Cornerstone Bank currently employs 12 in its new location, but the office can accommodate up to 30, Ingebrigtson said.

Our prediction: they’ll be needed. “This corner of the city, near the elbow of Interstates 29 and 229, is poised for transformation as developers and investors who own much of the remaining countryside continue to build out,” the Sioux Falls Argus Leader reported in November. And “the amount of development there today is nothing compared to what developers have in mind for tomorrow.”

Tom Dennis

Editor, Prairie Business 701-780-1276 tdennis@prairiebusinessmagazine.com

TOP LEFT: VIDEOCONFERENCING TECHNOLOGY IS AMONG THE FEATURES OF CORNERSTONE BANK’S NEW OFFICE IN SIOUX FALLS, S.D. IMAGE: CORNERSTONE BANK

TOP RIGHT: A FIREPLACE IN THE LOBBY IS ONE OF THE FEATURES OF CORNERSTONE BANK’S NEW BUILDING IN SIOUX FALLS, S.D. IMAGE: CORNERSTONE BANK

BOTTOM LEFT: ARTWORK IN CORNERSTONE BANK’S NEW SIOUX FALLS, S.D., OFFICE SHOWS THE FALLS OF THE BIG SIOUX RIVER, THE FEATURE FROM WHICH SIOUX FALLS GOT ITS NAME. IMAGE: CORNERSTONE BANK

BOTTOM RIGHT: CORNERSTONE BANK CURRENTLY EMPLOYS 12 AT ITS NEW OFFICE IN SIOUX FALLS, S.D., BUT THE OFFICE COULD ACCOMMODATE UP TO 30. IMAGE: CORNERSTONE BANK

CORNERSTONE BANK STAFF POSE ON THE UPPER LEVEL OF THE BANK'S NEW BUILDING IN SIOUX FALLS, S.D. IMAGE: CORNERSTONE BANK