The Wasserstrom Co., a Columbus, Ohio-based restaurant and foodservice supply distributor, appears to be expanding to West Jacksonville.
A building-permit application shows a $246,354 renovation at the Westside Industrial Park. The building area is shown as 145,244 square feet of space, comprising 142,494 square feet of storage area and 2,750 square feet of business area.
Wasserstrom representatives have not returned telephone calls for comment.
Pattillo Construction Corp. is the contractor for the project, at 4601 Bulls Bay Highway, No. 105.
The cost reflects renovations to the computer room and a warehouse upgrade as well as an addition of restrooms.
Building plans show interior modifications to an existing tenant space.
Wasserstrom operates five distribution centers, including a Jacksonville facility at 9400 Busch Drive in North Jacksonville, according to the wasserstrom.com site.
Duval County property records show the Busch Drive property is owned by Jacksonville Ten LLC, whose manager is Reid Wasserstrom at Wasserstrom's Columbus headquarters.
Records show the 62,390-square-foot warehouse, in Imeson International Industrial Park, was built in 1984. It sits on 6.9 acres and is valued at $1.55 million.
The loopnet.com real estate site shows it is for sale at $2.99 million and describes it as a 62,000-square-foot warehouse with 2.5 acres of the site an expansion area for another 40,000 square feet of space.
Mark Wainwright of Pine Street/RPS LLC and Michael J. Canella with Canella Properties represent Wasserstrom.
Pattillo Industrial Real Estate represents and manages Westside Industrial Park.
The Busch Drive property has been owned by Wasserstrom family members since at least 2003, according to Duval County property records.
The Westside Industrial Park is owned by Stone Mountain Industrial Park of Atlanta.
Wasserstrom's site calls the company the world's leading restaurant supplier and distributor of food-service supplies and equipment.
It says the company has been in business since 1902, providing kitchen and catering supplies from the industry's leading manufacturers.
"We cater to the specific needs of every customer, regardless of size, whether you are a single independent restaurant, a national restaurant chain, a supermarket, health care facility or hotel operator," it says.
Wasserstrom has more than 1,200 employees and remains family-run by the third and fourth generations, according to the site.
In addition to its Columbus headquarters, the company has distribution centers in Columbus; Jacksonville; Allentown, Pa.; Dallas; and Phoenix.
Keystone Automotive also moving to Westside Industrial Park
Westside Industrial Park is gaining another tenant. Keystone Automotive, part of Chicago-based LKQ Corp., signed a lease for 51,000 square feet of space to expand and relocate from Talleyrand Avenue.
Keystone Automotive general manager Xumar Torres said the business outgrew the 429 Talleyrand Ave. facility.
"We need more room for growth and it is a better distribution location for our product offering to the city. We cover a good portion of the state of Florida and Georgia, also," Torres said.
He expected the move would take place in August. The Westside address will be 4101-1 Bulls Bay Highway.
Torres said the Talleyrand building, at 38,000 square feet of space, offered about 760,000 cubic feet of space while the Westside Industrial Park location offered 1.6 million cubic feet.
Keystone Automotive offers automotive parts to the collision and mechanical industry, such as body shops and dealerships, he said.
Torres said he has a staff of 55.
Torres said the Downtown area site along Talleyrand Avenue, near EverBank Field, is a good distribution site for the city, but the Westside address is more convenient for distribution to the region.
Keystone distributes south to Ocala and north to the Georgia cities of Valdosta and Savannah.
He said Keystone will take part of a 150,000-square-foot building, which provides space for growth.
LKQ also has a Pick Your Part operation at 10950 Normandy Blvd.
LKQ Corp.'s lkqcorp.com site says it is the largest nationwide provider of alternative collision replacement parts and a leading provider of recycled engines and transmissions and remanufactured engines, all in connection with the repair of automobiles and other vehicles.
The company also has operations in the United Kingdom; the Benelux region of
Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg; France; Canada; Mexico; and Central America. LKQ operates more than 500 facilities. It was founded in 1998. It bought Keystone Automotive in 2007.
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