Chevron to Move Out of S.F. After 122 Years

Oil giant Chevron Corp. said Wednesday that it will end its 122-year history as a San Francisco company by moving its headquarters to a suburban campus in San Ramon, 40 miles east of its current home.

The move, expected to be completed by the end of next year, represents a bigger blow to San Francisco’s pride than its economic vitality.

Formerly one of the city’s largest employers, Chevron has just 200 workers at its San Francisco headquarters. To save money, Chevron opened a 92-acre campus in San Ramon in 1985 and began transferring administrative workers to the 13-building complex.

The most recent wave of transfers occurred after Chevron sold its San Francisco headquarters in 1999 and moved 900 workers from San Francisco to San Ramon. After selling its offices, Chevron leased 10 floors of its old headquarters to maintain its San Francisco presence.

With 3,500 workers now in San Ramon, Chevron Chairman David O’Reilly said it had become too cumbersome to continue running the company from San Francisco.

“While San Francisco is a great location, we need to bring all of our people together,” O’Reilly said.

With $48 billion in revenue last year, Chevron ranks as the second-largest company in the San Francisco Bay Area behind Palo Alto-based Hewlett-Packard Co. Chevron is about to become even bigger with the acquisition of White Plains, N.Y.-based Texaco Inc., which posted revenue of $51 billion last year. Chevron expects to take control of Texaco next month.

Chevron’s San Francisco roots date to 1879 when its forerunner, Pacific Coast Oil Co., launched operations. Later, Pacific Coast merged with John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil Co., helping to create a monopoly that was broken up by the U.S. courts in 1911.