From a kitchen table in 2008 to a North Jacksonville warehouse seven years later, JZ Expedited Logistics is on the move.
The Jacksonville-based company moves freight — over water, in the air, on the rails and over the roads. It also can manage warehousing for customers’ goods. The “expedited” in the name means founder and owner Robert Fox offers to move it quickly.
It’s the company’s turn to move this time. It intends to relocate its operations and corporate headquarters from leased space at Beach and Southside boulevards to a much larger warehouse at 9601 N. Main St., Suite 1, in Imeson International Industrial Park.
Fox said the company has experienced 15-20 percent growth every year.
JZ Expedited also will launch its warehousing component, which now is subcontracted at Imeson.
The company, named after Fox’s now college-age sons, Josh and Zach, will lease about 40,000 square feet from landlord Webb International Inc. Offices should move June 22 and the remaining operations by Aug. 1.
Headquarters staff is up to about 25 employees, said Fred Schloth, vice president of sales and marketing.
Schloth said JZ Expedited’s warehouse services will take up 32,000 square feet of space, including 2,500 square feet of temperature-controlled space for sensitive products like cosmetics and cigars.
“It’s a big step. We think this is the way for us to go the next level and take that step,” Schloth said. “The timing couldn’t be better.”
Schloth explains that JZ Expedited Logistics specializes in “hotshot” last-minute cargo delivery, both domestically and internationally. It can provide domestic truck service, rail, air and ocean services.
It also provides hazardous materials handling and storage, including Class 1 explosives.
The new warehouse allows it to provide cross-dock trans-load services, warehousing and temperature-controlled storage. It also will have two rail doors to accommodate rail cars.
Fox launched JZ Expedited Logistics in 2008 and JZ Expedited Trucking in 2014. His biographical information shows that was after more than 20 years in the logistics industry, working around the country for companies including Yellow Freight Systems, Crowley Logistics and General Transport before starting his own company.
With a degree in criminal justice from Michigan State University in 1987, Fox’s first job was as a special agent in Miami for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (now the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). But during college, he loaded trucks for Roadway Express, and he soon decided trucking was his path.
“He’s a driven guy,” Schloth said.
Schloth’s role is to help develop the sales force. The company also has agents in Georgia and New Jersey and is looking for more.
He said the shipment size could be a truckload or a package. “Somebody calls and says ‘I need this in tomorrow,’ we can do that,” he said.
The company provides third-party logistics trucking and brokerage services with intermodal rail access with Union Pacific, CSX, BNSF Railway and Norfolk Southern.
Warehouse services will comprise the space, two CSX rail-side doors, forklift capability, a four-bay door with full cross-dock capability, security cameras and is TSA-certified by the U.S. Homeland Security. TSA secured storage space will be available Aug. 10.
JZ Expedited Trucking, a separate company, provides drivers, trucks and trailers.
For information about its services, visit jzexplogistics.com.
Cologix sells data center to affiliated company
Cologix sold the Southside data-center facility it bought in August to a third-party affiliate that shares a number of common investors.
Communications Realty Investments Jacksonville LLC paid $6.7 million to acquire the facility at 4800 Spring Park Road from Cologix Jacksonville LLC. The companies are based in the same office in Denver.
Cologix acquired the facility when it bought the Colo5 colocation and disaster recovery provider last summer. The center is a little more than 120,000 square feet in size and also is a hurricane-rated data center.
Synovus Bank issued a $4.69 million loan to Communications Realty Investments.
The sale and mortgage were executed last week.
Cologix said Communications Realty Investments is a third-party affiliate with a number of common investors with Cologix, although it is a separate legal and operating entity.
Last week, the city issued a permit for $6.6 million in renovations to the building. Cologix said in April the work is part of a $20 million investment in Jacksonville.
The company is a network-neutral interconnection and data center company. It came to the Jacksonville market by acquiring Jax Meet Me Room, a carrier hotel Downtown at 421 W. Church St. called Cologix Jax 1. Spring Park Road is Cologix Jax 2.
Both centers are being upgraded.
J&J continues expansion
Johnson & Johnson Vision Care is adding another project at its Southside contact-lens manufacturing plant, although on a much smaller scale than its Phase 6 expansion that is wrapping up and the Phase 7 that is in city review for approvals and incentives.
Johnson & Johnson Vision Care proposes a 3GT Waste Plastic expansion, which will replace the existing system with a modern unit that will handle increased plastic waste productivity for its manufacturing area.
The company does not disclose specific business or investment costs for facility improvements. It makes disposable contact lenses there.
The project, a 1,313-square-foot building attached to the manufacturing plant, is expected to be completed by July 2016. The city and the St. Johns River Water Management District are reviewing plans for it.
It is separate from Phase 7, a proposed $301 million expansion with 100 new jobs in exchange for almost $98.6 million in city and state incentives.
Phase 6 was a $218 million addition to create up to 100 jobs. City and state incentives for that could total $8.6 million.
Vision Care also is working on a solvent tank farm structure and a central utility plant.
Vision Care occupies almost 69 acres at 7500 Centurion Parkway in Deerwood Park and employs about 2,000 people in Jacksonville. The additions would boost its size to almost 882,000 square feet.
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