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‘Quite passionate about our mission’: Global provider of lab products builds new headquarters in Vernon Hills

Heathrow Scientific’s new consolidated headquarters at 440 Fairway Drive in Vernon Hills includes expanded warehouse space. Courtesy of Premier Design + Build Group
Heathrow Scientific’s new headquarters at 440 Fairway Drive in Vernon Hills includes about 13,000 square feet of office space. Courtesy of Premier Design + Build Group
Heathrow Scientific recently opened a new headquarters at 440 Fairway Drive in Vernon Hills. The 112,711-square-foot building includes office and warehouse space in a consolidated headquarters for the growing company. Courtesy of Premier Design + Build Group

Unless you're a research scientist or work in a clinical lab you may not have heard of Heathrow Scientific. But the Vernon Hills-based company for some time has had a global reach and continues to grow.

Founded in 1996 by Jim Woldenberg with a single employee, one customer and two products, Heathrow Scientific now offers about 1,000 laboratory products used in clinical and research labs, and launches more than a dozen new ones — many unique to the market — every year.

Heathrow Scientific founder Jim Woldenberg at the company’s new headquarters in Vernon Hills. Courtesy of Heathrow Scientific

The name came from Heathrow Drive in Lincolnshire where Woldenberg created the new business originally while running a distribution company in the same industry.

“We literally put two phones on a customer service rep’s desk and said, ‘When this one rings say Heathrow Scientific,’” he recalled.

The company grew quickly and moved to Vernon Hills in 2000.

“We were the only ones coming out with new fresh colors and new products,” said Woldenberg, company president. “We have evolved quite a bit in our product design and innovation.”

As the pace continued, Heathrow outgrew its facility at 620 Lakeview Parkway in the Continental Executive Parke and was operating out of two buildings, moving inventory back and forth.

About 45% of Heathrow’s products are exported and used in about 80 countries. They are designed, developed and engineered in Vernon Hills and produced by a network of contract manufacturers, including many in Asia. Heathrow has sales offices in Germany, the United Kingdom and Singapore.

Laboratory equipment and supplies are used in university settings, pharmaceutical companies, hospitals and laboratories, Woldenberg said.

Planning for a new home to consolidate operations began in 2023. A vacant office building nearby was acquired and demolished and a sleek new headquarters with warehouse and office space designed for 10 years of growth built at 440 Fairway Drive.

The two-story building is about 113,000 square feet and includes 13,000 square feet of office space. Warehouse/distribution, expanded research/development and quality control areas, full workout facilities with showers, equipment, furniture and other elements are part of a total investment of about $20 million.

Transition to the new space began a few weeks ago.

Expansion is for the benefit of the “real geniuses here, the product development engineers and specialists,” Woldenberg said. “They needed more resources and we have given it to them.”

An array of 430 solar panels powers the facility and a hybrid HVAC system that switches from electric to gas when the temperature drops to 45 degrees was installed. Insulated precast concrete panels and other measures are among green features incorporated in the facility with sustainability as the focus.

“It’s a good business decision because our customers are asking us to do these things,” Woldenberg said.

The company considers environmental factors in all products and operations he added.

A unique feature of the project that required village approval was “land banking” parking space. The project was approved for 63 parking spaces, well below the required 107-space minimum.

Sixty-three spaces is more than enough to meet the demand, Heathrow told village officials. The company has about 45 employees but some work from home and others live out of state.

Instead, the would-be parking will remain green space and an agreement outlining the circumstances when it would need to be built was incorporated in the village approvals.

A driving company philosophy is to provide lab technicians using Heathrow products new and innovative tools to do their jobs “so they concentrate on what’s really important — scientific discovery,” Woldenberg said.

“We are quite passionate about our mission here,” he added.

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