GOING PLACES: TRANSPORTATION, DISTRIBUTION AND WAREHOUSING
Patrick L. Thimangu
Distribution Management Inc. is moving its local warehouse operations to a more than 70,000-square-foot facility in Hazelwood.
Thomas Fleming, president, chief executive and founder of Distribution Management, said the company is making the move because it has run out of space at its 50,000-square-foot warehouse in St. Charles.
Distribution Management does business through its Supplies Network subsidiary and Web site, which specialize in wholesaling computer, copier, fax and printer supplies to independent retailers.
Distribution Management's move comes as the company remains on track to grow its revenue by 14 percent this year, to $300 million, Fleming said. The transfer to a larger warehouse at 4774 Park 370 Boulevard in Hazelwood follows rapid expansion by the company, which also opened a 50,000-square-foot distribution center in Fresno, Calif., in March.
"We have outgrown our facility in St. Charles," Fleming said. "We have been here eight years." The move does not affect the company's headquarters in Missouri Research Park in St. Charles.
Lynn Schenck, vice president at Grubb & Ellis|Krombach Partners, represented Distribution Management in leasing the space in Hazelwood, which was listed at $3.75 per square foot. Ed Lampitt, vice president at Trammell Crow Co., represented First Industrial Development Services, which owns the warehouse.
The move to Hazelwood will bring Distribution Management's local warehouse close to the Earth City facilities of United Parcel Service Inc. (UPS), its main shipping vendor, Fleming said. The close proximity, he said, will save Distribution Management an undisclosed amount of transportation costs, especially now, when gasoline and diesel prices are at all-time highs.
Fleming said he was seeking a new warehouse in which Distribution Management could easily install more modern transportation technology equipment, including material-handling machines, and bar coding and reading equipment. Installing newer technology in the existing St. Charles facility, which ships more than 1,000 orders daily, would have been difficult to do without disrupting business operations, he said.
Distribution Management's other distribution warehouses are based in Dallas and Harrisburg, Pa. The Dallas distribution center ships 550 orders each day while the Harrisburg locations ships more than 1,000 orders each day.
Fleming said Distribution Management will likely move to the Hazelwood warehouse in November when interior renovations to the facility are complete. The company does not plan to add to the 22 employees currently working in the St. Charles warehouse, he said.
Lampitt said the modern type of warehouse space that Distribution Management has leased in Hazelwood is in high demand. Specifically, there are no class A warehouses of around 100,000 square feet, that were built after 1988 and are available in the St. Louis area, Lampitt said.
According to Lampitt, the newer warehouse buildings like those at Park 370 have higher ceilings, better fire-sprinkler systems and a higher dock-per-square-foot ratio than older warehouses. The high dock ratio means they can accommodate more loading trucks.
Hazelwood in general, Lampitt said, is a suitable location for companies that want to take advantage of close proximity to major highways as well as Lambert-St. Louis International Airport to ship their products.
pthimangu@bizjournals.com
