headquarter

To headquarter means to place the main office or main command center of a group in a certain place. You may talk about a company choosing to headquarter in a busy city or a team deciding to headquarter near the people it serves.

In everyday English, you will usually see this idea in the form *headquartered, as in, "The coffee chain is headquartered in Seattle." That form tells you where the center of an organization is. The plain verb headquarter* exists, but it is less common in normal speech and writing.

To headquarter means to establish the main office, command center, or administrative base of an organization in a specific place. It is a verb, but it is not the form native speakers use most often. Much more often, you will meet the past participle or adjective-like form *headquartered*.

For example, a company might announce plans to headquarter its new European division in Berlin. In that sentence, the company is choosing Berlin as the place from which that division will be run.

However, native speakers most often use *headquartered* in news reports, company profiles, and formal writing: "The United Nations is headquartered in New York City," or "The car manufacturer is headquartered in Detroit." In those examples, the word tells you the official home base of the organization.

The idea can apply to businesses, government groups, and military units. Still, if you are learning everyday English, it is more useful to recognize and use *be headquartered in* than to use the base verb by itself. So when you decide where the central operations of a group will be, you are deciding where it will be headquartered.