ROX Interview: Jackob Andersen, President & CEO of Saint Holdings
by Rock Earle | Pinal County Living
I first met Jackob Andersen sometime in the early 2000s, introduced by a contractor partner, Tim Smith. He and I were in the final stages of our ownership (and redevelopment) of Eloy Industrial Park things were popping and everything was rosy.
The purpose of the introduction was to acquaint me with a new civil engineering firm that had been recently formed by Jackob and was looking for projects in the Casa Grande area.
Fast forward a couple of years: Eloy Industrial Park had sold, the Great Recession had begun, and I was off traveling, but Tim had taken his expertise in rail-served industrial development to Jackob, and along with his longtime partner Joe Jarvis, they bought the 160-acre farm which would shortly become Central Arizona Commerce Park. And the rest is history, I guess, as they say.
As you will read, Jackob brought his keen eye for macro trends and his nuts-and-bolts experience in developing real estate to what we here at ROX Group like to call “Arizona’s Golden Corridor” — presciently observing that its location, coupled with land availability and infrastructure would be, in the long run, an absolute winner.
GC Living: I’m with Jackob Andersen from Saint Holdings. Start with telling us about yourself, about your family, where you grew up and went to school and such.
Jackob Andersen: I’m Danish by nationality, but I was born in the United Kingdom, and I’m the middle one of three boys. We were put into the English boarding school system, which I guess people would think is a little bit like a Hogwarts. You go to school wearing a little felt cap and a little felt blazer and shorts, with a little green tie, black shoes and socks pulled up to your knees.
You go to chapel every morning, and you have a pretty rigid system. The first school I went to was called Saint Christopher’s, which is where the name Saint Holdings came from. That’s where Joe (Jarvis) and I met when we were 4 years old in kindergarten. It’s a friendship that stretches back now 42 years, and he’s like a fourth brother to me.
