Looking for something cold? Cold storage has become hot – no pun intended – lately with the growth in online groceries and e-commerce. Now, JLL Capital Markets is marketing a joint venture equity opportunity on behalf of Cold Creek Solutions for the development of a 374,560-square-foot, speculative, state-of-the-art cold storage facility in a premier cold storage submarket within Dallas-Fort Worth area.
The facility will have a clear height of 45 feet for the warehouse and 28 feet for the cold dock, allowing for more than 60,000 pallet positions; multiple tenant suites with convertible temperature functionality; 53 refrigerated loading positions; 65 trailer parking spaces; and ample car parking. The facility will be located on about 23 acres just northwest of Interstate 35 and Barthold Road in the Denton Industrial submarket.
Once completed, the project will be only the 15th cold storage facility constructed in the last 20 years in Texas. Out of the top 10 cold storage markets by capacity, the state of Texas is the most underserved state with the lowest capacity per capita of the subset.
The recent explosion of e-commerce adoption and the rise of online grocery demand during the pandemic has increased the need for cold storage space. Coupled with the age of the majority of cold storage product in the market and lack of available supply, the demand for new construction is stronger than ever, demonstrated by a current cold storage occupancy rate of 98.2 percent.
JLL Research identified eight key trends across the cold storage sector in its Cold Storage in the post-COVID economy whitepaper, and the rise of speculative construction was one of them. Given the complexity in design, the increased demand as noted above and high costs in renovating older warehouses to cold storage, speculative construction for new cold storage assets is gaining popularity, according to JLL..
“The Cold Creek team is excited to bring this project to the market to help meet the critical need for frozen and refrigerated infrastructure in the DFW Metroplex,” said Matt McWilliams President and Managing Partner, Cold Creek Solutions, LP. “Being in close proximity to both Dallas and Fort Worth, our location was chosen to serve businesses that currently operate in the DFW area as well as those coming to the metroplex to take advantage of our booming local economy and access to our expansive transportation and logistics infrastructure.”
The JLL Capital Markets Equity Placement team representing the developer is being led by Senior Managing Director Dustin Volz, Senior Director Marc Duval, Directors Will Mogk and Dom Espinosa Associate Wells Waller and Analyst Pauli Kerr.
