Challenge
Two customers in the food and floral industries needed specific cold facilities to expand their production and distribution operations. Each had different requirements for cooler, freezer, dry/ambient and office space in order to meet their customer demands and scale their businesses.
Solution
In 2020, Scout Cold purchased a 332,000-square-foot, Class-A, dry shell warehouse from an industrial developer, Johnson Development Associates, in Greenwich Township, New Jersey. Scout leased the building to the two organizations, working with each company to design their ideal improvements. Scout then led the planning, permitting and construction to deliver turn-key cold improvements on-schedule, on-budget and with excellent quality.
Improvements included converting the building with cooler and freezer improvements designed to meet the customers’ specific requirements. Insulated metal panel walls and ceilings were employed for refrigerated processing rooms and cold dock areas. State-of-the-art cold storage improvements to the facility included floor drains, fire sprinklers installed in an interstitial area between the warehouse ceiling and the cold box, insulated doors and heated freezer flooring.
The cross-docked property includes 36-foot clear heights, 61 loading docks and two drive-in doors. Outside, the facility offers 32 trailer parking spaces and 184 car parking spaces.
Altogether, Scout invested over $27 million in these improvements on behalf of the two customers.
Results
The flexibility of converting a dry shell warehouse enabled Scout to build the exact food production and distribution areas with multiple refrigerated, freezer and ambient areas required to support our customers’ effective business operations.
Each of the customers now has a fully operational space where they can efficiently process goods. One customer made significant investments in production equipment and mezzanine.
Additionally, the New Jersey location has proved ideal for the tenants: The property is located just off I-295 and the New Jersey Turnpike, providing easy access to millions of residents along the Eastern Seaboard including New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Washington, D.C.
Cold Storage Portfolio
Scout currently leases well-located properties in Los Angeles, Denver, Dallas, Houston and Atlanta that can be converted with cooler and freezer spaces to meet companies’ unique requirements. Scout also purchases land or buildings in other cities to create facilities for customers’ business growth needs.
Annually, Scout designs and constructs the conversion of over one million square feet of dry warehouse space to temperature-controlled production, refrigerated environments and freezer storage to meet our customers’ unique requirements. The Scout team works with customers to design, build and fund the cold space they need to modernize cold facilities, improve operational efficiency and grow businesses.
Please contact us at info@scoutcold.com or visit www.scoutcold.com to learn more.
