for the baseball stadium see safeco field . safeco insurance type subsidiary industry insurance founded seattle washington 1923 headquarters seattle washington united states key people matthew nickerson president products insurance auto insurance homeowners insurance liability insurance title insurance revenue 6.29 billion usd 2006 sales net income 880 million usd 2006 number of employees 7 200 2004 http finance.yahoo.com q pr s saf parent liberty mutual website www.safeco.com safeco insurance a member of liberty mutual group is a national u.s. insurance company . it holds naming rights to the seattle mariners baseball stadium safeco field . contents 1 history 2 acquisitions 3 restructuring 4 liberty mutual insurance 5 philanthropy 6 notes 7 references 8 external links history edit safeco was founded in seattle washington in 1923 by hawthorne k. dent as the general insurance company of america a property and casualty insurer . this name is still used by safeco on some of its insurance products . note 1 thirty years later the company founded the selective auto and fire ensurance company of america or safeco i.e. s.a.f.e. co. . citation needed general insurance s first headquarters were in downtown seattle at the corner of university street and fourth avenue . in 1936 it moved to the eight story brooklyn building at the corner of n.e. 45th street and brooklyn avenue n.e. in the university district . citation needed general insurance began to sell life insurance in 1957 . eleven years later the corporate name changed from the general insurance company of america to safeco corporation . the company would end up changing the capitalization of its name from safeco to safeco at the turn of the century . around the same time the company began to offer mutual funds and commercial credit though precursors to the safeco funds had been around since the 1930s . citation needed safeco replaced the brooklyn building with the 22 story safeco plaza building in 1973 . it remains the tallest building in the city outside downtown . citation needed acquisitions edit in 1997 safeco bought american states financial corporation to expand beyond the west coast . washington mutual s wm life insurance company was purchased the same year . two years later safeco bought r.f. bailey underwriting agencies limited of london . citation needed restructuring edit in 2001 new management was brought in to restructure the company . commercial credit operations were sold to general electric in 2001 and on march 15 2004 the company announced the sale of its most profitable division the life insurance and investments business to a group of private investors led by safeco board members and warren buffett s berkshire hathaway inc. and white mountains insurance group ltd. incorporating as symetra financial corporation . the same day it was announced that hub international ltd. was buying safeco s insurance brokerage operations . less than a month later on april 12 it was announced that mellon financial corporation would buy safeco trust company whose business is providing financial and estate planning services to individuals with over 1 million in assets . on august 2 the closure of safeco asset management the mutual fund business was announced . citation needed the former safeco plaza now uw tower the current safeco plaza originally the seafirst building . on april 6 2005 ceo mike mcgavick announced that safeco would be consolidating operations at either the university district home office campus or the newer eastside campus in redmond pending a competition between microsoft and the university of washington for the sale of one or the other location . on january 19 2006 it was announced that microsoft would purchase the redmond campus for 209.5 million . 1 plans were announced for a new 125 feet 38 m office tower across the street from safeco plaza to house the approximately 1 300 redmond employees . 2 however mcgavick subsequently stepped down as ceo to run for the u.s. senate . 3 in a surprise move his replacement paula rosput reynolds announced on august 30 2006 that the entire university district complex would be sold as well to the university of washington for 130 million . 4 employees were told they would be moved to leased space in downtown seattle . some speculated this signalled the imminent sale of the company although safeco denied this . safeco moved back downtown in 2007 ; its new headquarters at 1001 fourth avenue became the new safeco plaza and the old safeco plaza was renamed university of washington plaza . 5 liberty mutual insurance edit on april 23 2008 safeco announced an agreement to be acquired by liberty mutual for 68.25 per share . 6 safeco continues to offer personal lines insurance including auto home motorcycle recreational vehicle watercraft and more through independent agents 7 philanthropy edit on february 12 2010 safeco announced its donation of more than 800 pieces of its safeco art collection to the washington art consortium . this move was hailed by members of the local arts community as being a significant and rare gift . 8 notes edit as of february 2014 update members of the safeco family of companies include american economy insurance company american states insurance company american states insurance company of texas american states lloyds insurance company american states preferred insurance company first national insurance company of america general insurance company of america insurance company of illinois safeco insurance company of america safeco insurance company of illinois safeco insurance company of indiana safeco insurance company of oregon safeco lloyds insurance company safeco national insurance company and safeco surplus lines insurance company . 1 references edit peterson kim january 18 2006 . microsoft to buy safeco s redmond office complex . the seattle times . retrieved july 6 2016 . young bob ; allison melissa march 25 2006 . safeco to sell tower in u district cancel plans for new one . the seattle times . retrieved july 6 2016 . mcgavick leaving safeco for possible senate run . puget sound business journal . july 18 2005 . retrieved july 6 2016 . iwaskai john august 28 2006 . uw makes landmark deal buys safeco tower . seattle post intelligencer . retrieved july 6 2016 . allison melissa may 25 2006 . safeco says headquarters to be in downtown tower . the seattle times . retrieved july 6 2016 . bogoslaw david april 23 2008 . liberty mutual pays up for safeco . bloomberg news . retrieved july 6 2016 . liberty mutual group completes safeco acquisition . insurance journal . september 24 2008 . retrieved july 6 2016 . tu janet i. february 11 2010 . safeco donating 3.5 million art collection to consortium of museums . the seattle times . archived from the original on september 21 2011 . retrieved july 6 2016 . external links edit official site historical annual reports for safeco v t e seattle based corporations within the seattle metropolitan area seattle and seatac based fortune 1000 corporations alaska airlines 482 amazon.com 49 expeditors international 428 nordstrom 227 starbucks 208 puget sound based fortune 1000 corporations companies listed above plus costco wholesale 22 expedia inc. 515 microsoft 35 paccar 168 puget sound energy 703 weyerhaeuser 363 major seattle and puget sound based non public or externally owned corporations big fish games darigold eddie bauer jones soda nash holdings nintendo of america qfc rei safeco t mobile us retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title safeco & oldid 737201396 categories insurance companies of the united statescompanies formerly listed on nasdaqcompanies based in seattlecompanies established in 1923hidden categories articles containing potentially dated statements from february 2014all articles containing potentially dated statementsall articles with unsourced statementsarticles with unsourced statements from july 2016 navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 1 september 2016 at 09 20 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; 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