About 1,000 Blue Shield of California employees will be coming to Long Beach this summer, when the company will open an office on the Aero Long Beach campus.

The nonprofit insurance provider’s decision to open a Long Beach location stemmed from its transition to a hybrid work model, explained spokesperson Mark Seelig.

“We’ve sort of tried to reconfigure and rethink … our real estate ideology,” Seelig said. “We’re trying to make the best use of our resources.”

The new office will consolidate three locations—Monterey Park, El Segundo and Costa Mesa—into one, said Seelig.

“We did an extensive search, and Long Beach won out,” Seelig said. “We were really excited to find a space there.”

The Long Beach space proved to be a desirable location partially due to its easy access to Long Beach Airport and highways, considering that many executives have to travel to different offices throughout California, Seelig said. Long Beach also served as a central location to the employees who will be commuting from around Los Angeles and Orange County, Seelig said.

Barring any unforeseen circumstances, the company expects to move into its new office at 3840 Kilroy Airport Way in early July, with plans to officially open for business on July 10.

The building is currently undergoing a redesign for certain specifications, and is a LEED, or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, Seelig said.

Introducing about 1,000 people to a new office building will certainly benefit the Long Beach economy, Seelig said—from parking, grabbing a morning coffee or bagel, dining out for lunch, or picking up groceries on the way home, he said.

“Long Beach is going to win big, I think, with 1,000 employees—not all there at the same time, of course, but certainly, just more folks are rolling in and being introduced to Long Beach as a community,” he said.

Some employees may even end up wanting to relocate to Long Beach, Seelig added.

Plus, according to Seelig, Blue Shield of California is a company that loves to give back and volunteer.

“Long Beach is definitely going to benefit in that capacity as well,” Seelig said. “Our employees are really, really strategic about looking at the landscape and finding spaces where we can make improvements that help underserved communities, residents … and to make a big difference.”

Ahead of the opening of the new office, work is already underway to establish community partnerships and introduce Blue Shield to Long Beach, said Seelig, referencing a new partnership with the Conservation Corps of Long Beach.

“We want to be good neighbors,” said Seelig. “We’re not just here to take up space and to be a big company,”

Seelig’s first week with the company, Blue Shield moved into its Oakland headquarters office, and immediately donated $1 million to a local nonprofit that served high school students from underprivileged communities, he said.

“It’s part of our culture,” Seelig said.

Along with establishing its new office, in an effort to further serve the Long Beach community, Blue Shield recently opened a community resource center located at 5599 Atlantic Ave., with a grand opening planned for June.

The community resource center will serve individuals from Long Beach as well as from surrounding communities such as Lakewood and Signal Hill, through a variety of different services and classes ranging from monthly food pantries, seasonal flu clinics, family cooking classes, exercise classes and homework assistance to K-12 students. Blue Shield Promise staff will be available to offer support to all individuals who come into the center, which is open to all community members.

“It’s an opportunity for underserved communities to come in and get top-notch services and clinical help,” Seelig said.

The Long Beach resource center is the 12th location of its kind, and it follows the opening of a similar space in Norwalk in March. Both centers are part of an L.A. Care’s and Blue Shield Promise $146 million commitment to operate 14 community resources centers in Los Angeles County.

“We’re super excited about this building and moving in,” Seelig said of the new Long Beach office. “Long Beach wins, Blue Shield wins, our members win because we’re excited to be doing more great work in the community.”