Amazon.com’s potential Softlines fulfillment center in Jacksonville appears to be at least a $55.5 million development project.
JPMorgan Chase Bank of Los Angeles made a construction mortgage and a fixture filing financing statement to developer JI Imeson Industrial Building E LLC for $55,496,000 on July 29.
JI Imeson Industrial Building E LLC is part of VanTrust Real Estate LLC of Kansas City, Missouri. It has a regional office in Jacksonville.
VanTrust Real Estate LLC is developing the 1.06 million-square-foot building on 51.33 acres in Imeson Park, at northeast North Main Street and Zoo Parkway. The Imeson Building E is at 10501 Cold Storage Road, No. 500.
VanTrust owns Imeson Park.
The city approved a permit July 31 for Evans General Contractors LLC of Savannah to build a $5.7 million warehouse foundation for the building. The city issued a related foundation permit in November for $100,000.
The city also is reviewing civil engineering plans and a permit application for construction of the building at a cost of almost $41.2 million.
VanTrust has been preparing for the 1,063,684-square-foot Softlines industrial facility, parking and utilities. England-Thims & Miller Inc. filed civil plans with the city June 18 and more Aug. 3.
Plans show more than 1,500 parking spaces for cars, which indicates a potential job count.
VanTrust Executive Vice President John Carey said July 31 that he is unable to comment.
Plans identify the client as Amazon and the warehouse as Softlines JAX7, which appears to be Amazon’s code for the location.
Softlines is Amazon’s category of apparel and shoes and also is a brand of Amazon footwear.
Seattle-based Amazon has not commented on what appears to be its eighth Northeast Florida project in three years, boosting its opened or planned presence to more than 4 million square feet of space.
Amazon has not said how many employees it has in Jacksonville, but a fulfillment center manager said previously it would be at least 5,000.
The first fulfillment center, to handle smaller items and electronics, opened in September 2017 in Northwest Jacksonville. The second, for larger goods, opened the following month in AllianceFlorida at Cecil Commerce Center in West Jacksonville.
Amazon opened a sortation center in Westside Industrial Park and a last-mile delivery station in North Jacksonville. It is working on a fulfillment center in West Jacksonville for heavy bulk items.
More last-mile delivery stations are on the way to a former Kmart on Blanding Boulevard in West Jacksonville and to St. Augustine.
Amazon launched its warehouse network in 1997 and now has more than 110 operational facilities in North America and is adding more.
It said it invested over $9 billion in capital projects, including fulfillment centers, in the second fiscal quarter.
Online sales during the pandemic boosted net sales 40% year-over-year to $89 billion in the second quarter and Amazon expects $93 million in the third.