"Millbrook Business Center was an experiment for us," saysHarvey Miller, managing director at Millbrook Properties. "The realestate team we put together went out and showed us thepossibilities."

Bringing over 20 years of activity to a close at the 72-acreMillbrook Business Center, the brothers will have erected sevenbuildings there when they finish a 65,000-sf speculative officestructure that is due to break ground next year. Just a few weeksago, Millbrook signed a $20-million build-to-suit lease with PlexusCorp. and Zenith Corp agreed to move its corporate headquarters tothe center around the same time. Millbrook Business Center, locatedin southern Lake County north of Chicago, also houses the formerheadquarters of Quill Corp., the firm the brothers founded.

While Mr. Miller would not say how much Staples paid for thecompany, the figure is reputed to be in the $600 million range. "Wewere paid Staples stock in consideration for Quill," says Miller,who, along with his brothers, sold the company in 1998. "We havedivested ourselves of a large amount that stock and now havesubstantial amounts of cash."