FlexCold announced Oct. 20 it opened its almost 150,000-square-foot Jacksonville cold-storage warehouse in North Jacksonville.
That comes as the city is reviewing civil engineering plans for a proposed 170,440-square-foot expansion as FlexCold Phase 2.
Arco Design/Build LLC of Atlanta and Jacksonville-based England-Thims & Miller Inc., the project’s civil engineer, submitted the plans Oct. 12.
The warehouse is 3 miles from JaxPort’s Blount Island Marine Terminal.
Both phases will occupy a 23.8-acre site at southwest Faye and Blasius roads.
FlexCold said in a news release that the first phase at 11180 Blasius Road offers 25,000 pallet positions and is divided among four areas: two convertible rooms that can be used for refrigerated or frozen products; a freezer room where temperatures are maintained below zero degrees; and a blast freeze room where products like poultry can be frozen to zero degrees within 36 hours.
It said USDA and FDA inspections are provided on-site.
The release said JaxPort is Florida’s No. 1 container port and provides accessibility to more than 98 million consumers within one day’s drive and direct ocean services to 140 ports in 70 countries.
FlexCold said its design increases storage capacity by 45% compared with traditional systems. It said its refrigeration system is roof-mounted, freeing floor space.
The Jacksonville City Council signed off April 16, 2021, on a five-year, $1.1 million Recapture Enhanced Value Grant property tax rebate for FlexCold LLC to build the 150,000-square-foot processing and distribution facility.
An economic development agreement approved with the bill showed a $47 million investment.
The deal stated that South Carolina-based FlexCold chose Jacksonville rather than other port cities on the U.S. East Coast and commits to creating 20 jobs by Dec. 31, 2023.
ARCO Design/Build and England-Thims & Miller Inc. also developed and designed the first phase.
The city issued a permit in September 2021 for construction of the warehouse.
FlexCold’s growth comes as cold-storage warehousing expands nationwide and in Jacksonville.
Ben Stewart, first vice president of industrial and logistics with the CBRE commercial real estate company, wrote in an Oct. 13 guest column in the Daily Record that the pandemic’s impact on grocery sales expedited the shift from in-person shopping to online ordering and home delivery.
That spurred demand for cold storage demand as e-commerce’s share of total U.S. grocery sales is expected to rise from 13 percent in 2021 to 21.5 percent in 2025.
Stewart said the growth is pushing existing cold storage supply chains to the limit and spurring new development.
“Today, a variety of existing of cold storage facilities service the Jacksonville market. This includes 30 million cubic feet of temperature-controlled warehouse space with over 100,000 pallet positions,” he wrote.
“However, these facilities are fully occupied and the region’s increasing demand for cold storage is enticing developers to deliver more inventory.”
FlexCold said its Jacksonville facility features:
• A 70-foot-deep chilled loading dock area with 27 bays and 18 reefer plug-ins.
• Both cooling and freezing with temperatures ranging from minus 10 degrees and 35 degrees
• On-site blast freezing, with a capacity of up to 12 loads per day.
• Comprehensive import/export services.
