Tribute to Kenny Schaper - A lifelong leader in the american poultry industry.

A tribute to Kenny Schaper a lifelong leader in the poultry industry.

All industries have certain individuals that provide leadership and vision, Kenny Schaper has immensely contributed to the poultry industry throughout his 44 year career. Kenny has served on numerous national boards that promoted and regulated the poultry industry into what it has become today.

Kenny started his career in 1957 selling chicken feed from his father's feed store located in Pana, Illinois. From chicken feed, Kenny quickly began selling baby chickens and then quickly developed into one of the Midwest's primary distributors of poultry. Throughout most of his 44 years, Kenny’s company, named Schaper Poultry, operated out of Tupelo, Mississippi and later on added a second distribution center in his hometown of Pana, Illinois. Pana is located in central Illinois and was ideally located to service several major distribution centers and also the Chicago market. Kenny’s clientele included such companies as the Jewel Food Stores, Supervalu and Associated Grocers. Schaper Poultry represented top-quality brands such as Gold Kist and ConAgra.

During his tenure in the poultry industry, Kenny served on the Board of Directors of the National Broiler Council for a total of 3 terms and specialized on being involved in their marketing committees with emphasis on international markets. Also, Mr. Schaper served was on the Board of Directors of NIFDA or the National Independent Food Distributors Association for 8 years and served an additional 9th year as President of the Board. Mr. Schaper was always looking for ways to expand the poultry market, and was heavily involved in international marketing.

Kenny's constituents respected his in-depth knowledge of all poultry products, as well as foresightedness in being able to expand the United States poultry market. His honesty and integrity permeated throughout his company and with all that were involved with him.

Kenny recently decided to close Schaper Company and enjoy retirement after a long, full and meaningful career in the poultry industry.

Kenny Schaper passed away June 13, 2011

Jim Cronin of Hawk Distribution Services www.hawkds.com was the listing agent on the Pana, Illinois refrigerated distribution facility. Jim can be contacted at 314-994-0577 or e-mail of j.cronin@hawkds.com

Refrigerated Warehouse Buildings and Mechanical Refrigeration System Types

Refrigerated Buildings and Refrigeration Mechanical  System Types.

All refrigerated warehouse buildings or refrigerated storage buildings or food production plants have to have a refrigeration mechanical system. When most prospective purchasers of buildings with freezer or cooler warehouse space start their existing property search, the subject of the refrigeration mechanical type is usually not considered. However this is a very important item when selecting a refrigerated food processing or a temperature controlled distribution facility. The very nature of the definition of temperature controlled real estate is that the industrial building has the capability of controlling the temperature inside that food processing or distribution/warehouse building or public refrigerated warehousing facility. Then the question is what the best type of refrigeration system?

There are only two types of refrigeration systems in an industrial warehouse that has storage space capable of cooler or freezer storage temperatures. Refrigerated or frozen food processing buildings, industrial refrigerated warehouse facilities or public refrigerated warehousing companies all occupy facilities that are dependent for their desired temperatures by either Freon refrigeration mechanicals or ammonia refrigeration mechanical systems. The decision on whether to select a Freon mechanical system or ammonia refrigeration system usually is dependent on the engineering and design calculations that are part of new refrigerated facility construction. Such items as the temperature of the inbound product being placed into the warehouse, the daily number of dock door openings and closings into the cooler or freezer warehouse areas and also the insulation values the walls and ceiling panels are part of the engineering calculations necessary to define the amount of heat load it will need to be removed during a certain given period of time. Once this is established then the refrigeration mechanical system type can be selected.

The decision whether to select a Freon system or an Ammonia refrigeration system for a new temperature controlled facility is driven primarily by that system’s lifetime operating costs and also the refrigeration components initial price and installation. Generally an ammonia refrigeration system is more expensive to purchase and install but may have up to 30% lower operating cost than a Freon refrigeration system. However, a Freon refrigeration system is generally very affordable for new equipment, but may well have higher operating costs.

Additionally one of the items that are considered in selecting a refrigeration system is the amount of time the company is willing to spend overseeing the operation of the system. Ammonia refrigeration systems, although being more affordable to operate, do require more personnel hours supervising their operation. Freon refrigeration systems require substantially less personnel hours involved in their operation.

Finally, Ammonia refrigeration systems sometimes are not able to be installed a new refrigerated food processing facility or industrial temperature controlled warehouse because of zoning regulations prohibiting the ammonia gas at the proposed new construction site. These regulations incorporate security, fire and residential proximity considerations into the decision on whether or not to allow ammonia refrigeration systems to be installed in the new building.

Jim Cronin of Hawk Distribution Services, LLC has extensive experience in real estate brokerage of freezer or cooler buildings. Jim Cronin is located in St. Louis County, Missouri. Jim can be reached at 314-994-0577 or e-mail of j.cronin@hawkds.com Also Phil Pisciotta of the Kansas City, Missouri office of Hawk Distribution Services, LLC has decades of experience and extensive involvement with temperature controlled facilities and in particular all cooler warehouse facilities used by produce distribution companies. Phil Pisciotta can be reached at 816-510-2060 or p.pisciotta@hawkds.com

Kansas City Existing Property Search Frustrations

Metropolitan Kansas City Real Estate-Existing Property Search Frustrations.

The Metropolitan Kansas City area is generally been known for an abundance of temperature controlled space for lease. There are a number of reasons for this large amount of underground freezer and cooler warehouse space that is for rent. However, most refrigerated food processing companies or foodservice companies or frozen food distributors as well as fruit and produce distributors have usually been unsuccessful whatever they conduct an existing property search to purchase or lease an industrial building that has freezer or cooler warehouse space. Also refrigerated food processing companies have generally not been successful in finding existing locations to purchase or lease within the Metropolitan Kansas City area.

There are numerous reasons there is lack of temperature controlled space or refrigerated warehouse space (to include food manufacturing facilities) in both the Kansas portion and the Missouri portion of the greater metropolitan Kansas City area. The first reason is of course the large amount of underground freezer warehouse and cooler space is available only for lease. There may be more underground freezer warehouse space available in the greater Kansas City area than in any other metropolitan area in the United States. Refrigerated food processing and distribution companies have used this underground space to forestall any additions to their existing temperature controlled facility, thereby having a total effect on the entire Kansas City refrigerated building market thereby causing a lack of above ground facilities being to be constructed at any one time. This also resulted in the cumulative effect of less total square footage of aboveground freezer or cooler space than most primary metropolitan markets. A second reason is that the downtown portion of Kansas City has been extremely desirable for residential conversions of older industrial properties, which do include the freezer and cooler warehouse buildings in that are in interior downtown corridor or as well as smaller processing facilities that were always located in the central portion of primary metropolitan areas. Because of this urban revitalization that resulted in the conversion of industrial facilities to residential applications of older temperature controlled real estate facilities that naturally would have otherwise come into the refrigerated industrial real estate market never became available to the Kansas City-based refrigerated food processor or frozen food distributor doing business in metropolitan Kansas City and the surrounding Midwest. Most refrigerated food companies found existing property searches frustrating and inefficient.

Over the last 12 months, there have been a number of temperature controlled space users that have had to begin construction of new refrigerated facilities, despite exhaustive efforts to locate an existing industrial facility with freezer and or cooler warehouse storage or refrigerated processing space.

Hawk Distribution Services is Kansas City's only temperature controlled real estate brokerage agency. Phil Pisciotta has extensive knowledge of the Kansas City temperature controlled real estate market. Phil Pisciotta has experience in both refrigerated processing and temperature controlled industrial distribution facilities that require freezer or cooler warehouse temperatures. There is no industrial real estate agent, other than Phil Pisciotta, that works exclusively with temperature controlled real estate in the Kansas City area and surrounding region. Phil Pisciotta has a thorough understanding of the unique complexities of leasing, occupying and then vacating a temperature controlled facility under the best possible terms and conditions.

To contact Phil Pisciotta, a real estate agent, either call 816-510-2060 or e-mail p.pisciotta@hawkds.com or to view Phil Pisciotta’s real estate listings go to http://www.hawkds.com/

Alternative usage for refrigerated food warehouse buildings.

Alternative usage for refrigerated foodservice warehouse buildings.

The foodservice distribution facility is one of the most recent styles of food facilities types of temperature controlled real estate. Refrigerated food processing facilities began to appear about 100 years ago. Temperature controlled or refrigerated warehouse buildings date back as far as the 1860s if you consider the use of ice as the refrigerant type. The foodservice distribution facility, as industrial real estate market understands this multiple temperature industrial building, did not began being constructed until about the mid- 1960s. In the 1970s, the new construction of foodservice distribution buildings rapidly accelerated as the foodservice industry was also undergoing a rapid expansion in accordance with the American public's consumption and dining habits.
The 1970s, Foodservice distribution buildings had floor plans that included approximately 8% temperature controlled warehouse space. Today's new construction of Foodservice distribution industrial warehouse facilities may have as much as 50% freezer warehouse and cooler warehouse floor space. This dramatic increase in the amount of the refrigerated portion of a Foodservice building demonstrates the continually increasing consumption of refrigerated and frozen food products in the retail, wholesale and fast food marketplaces.
As Foodservice distribution facilities became available for resale typically there were two types of purchasers of this multiple temperature controlled industrial real estate building. The first type of purchaser was a landlord that would buy the facility and then lease the freezer and cooler warehouse space to one tenant and the dry warehouse space to another tenant and occasionally lease the office space out to another tenant. The second type of purchaser of a Foodservice distribution facility was a refrigerated public warehousing company. Many of these facilities had a floor plan with total square footage of 150,000 to 250,000 ft.² which allowed for the optimum revenues and expenses for a single location for a public refrigerated warehousing company. The 3 warehouse storage temperatures of freezer warehouse, cooler warehouse and dry warehouse provided the temperature flexibility that these third-party purveyors of warehousing services required for their clientele.

A typical Foodservice distribution building is a facility available through Hawk Distribution Services,LLC http://www.hawkds.com/ located at 7095 Vicksburg Pike, Ft. Wayne, Indiana 46804. This facility was bought and then used by a public refrigerated warehousing company. The building is a total of 139,000 ft.² and situated on 10 acres of land. The building has 45,000 ft.² of freezer warehouse and another 55,000 ft.² of warehouse space that is either be for cooler warehouse storage or for ambient/dry warehouse storage. The available services include dry, cooler and freezer public warehousing services as well as warehouse space leasing for freezer warehouse space for lease or for cooler warehouse space for rent.Norfolk Southern rail Road service is available to the refrigerated building.

Online tour of this facility is available at http://property.loopnet.com/14986479 or for further information  contact Jim Cronin, a real estate broker at 314-994-0577 or e-mail j.cronin@hawkds.com

 To view other freezer or cooler warehouse buildings for sale or for lease in the Midwest go to www.hawkds.com

Marketing and Real Estate Brokeage of Freezer Warehouse Buildings in Small Industrial Markets

Small Industrial Markets and demand for refrigerated building real estate.

There always is a limited demand in a smaller industrial market for refrigerated buildings. This demand is simply defined as "distance” from the refrigerated building that is for sale or for lease. The demand which is “distance” from the building is generally held to be 20 miles in a small industrial market. Whatever business the prospect is involved in which motivates the use of an industrial freezer or cooler warehouse building, will then always have a customer base that supports the food distribution or food processing business of the prospect. Every customer base has a tolerance on how many miles they will drive to consume/purchase any certain goods or services. There always be some variance from that "20 mile" figure according to what type of good or service will be purchased. The more frequent the consumption/purchase the less the mileage tolerance will be of the prospect’s customer base.

Most typically the prospective purchaser or lessee for refrigerated building in a small industrial market has outgrown their freezer and cooler building. Sometimes the purchaser has have been in several different facilities and will need to consolidate for one of two reasons. The first reason is that a rental property was no longer available to the prospect to occupy, for such reasons as the end of the lease term or eminent domain. The second reason is that consolidation into one single refrigerated building location will now result in lower operating costs for the prospect’s business operations.

Usually most of these businesses are owned by individuals that have a desire to purchase rather than lease so as to be able to build equity in the industrial freezer or cooler building and therefore increase their own personal net worth. Any prospective purchaser of a building will look at the replacement cost [new construction] when considering buying a used industrial food processing or distribution building for their own use. This consideration of new construction is because there is usually not any recent sales comparables a "similar and like Industrial buildings" in the small industrial market. The new construction price will always be a benchmark in establishing a sale price for the used industrial facility.

When marketing industrial real estate in a small industrial market it is always important to remember that the highest likelihood that the best prospects for the sale or lease of the refrigerated facility will be from within a 20 mile radius of that refrigerated facility. As the real estate broker saying always goes, "sell it to the neighbor".

Hawk Distribution Services, LLC has experience in offering refrigerated warehouse buildings for sale or for lease in rural industrial markets. Contact Jim Cronin, a refrigerated building real estate broker at 314-994-0577 e-mail of j.cronin@hawkds.com

To view refrigerated buildings for sale or freezer warehouse space for lease in St. Louis, Missouri and Kansas City, Missouri and other areas in the Midwest go to www.hawkds.com

Underground Refrigerated Warehouse Space Build Out

The construction buildout or Finish Out for a refrigerated food processing plant or refrigerated warehouse space within an underground warehouse facility offers many different types of operational cost savings and lower lease rental rates when it is compared to above ground new facility construction pricing of a refrigerated food processing facility a refrigerated distribution center.
Some rental rates for refrigerated processing or refrigerated warehousing can be up to 50% less than similar like facilities constructed above ground.

One additional attribute that an underground warehouse space as as compared to an aboveground new construction site is the timing required to deliver a new refrigerated processing facility. An underground facility already has most all of the infrastructure in place and ready for interior buildout where an above ground facility does not. Innerstructure include such things as municipal water and sewer, zoning ordinance approval as well as electrical service and even such things as service roads already exist in an underground facility such as 440 Bussen Underground Drive, St. Louis, Missouri 63129.

An underground warehouse facility already has the warehouse floors, ceilings and wallsand all of the utility services available and in place to the underground warehouse floor space. All that is required is to finish out of the interior floorspace to the tenant specifications. An aboveground facility using requires such things as land acquisition, architectural drawings for the facility, possibly bank financing if the facility is owned by the occupant, zoning requirements approved. Also when construction does start on aboveground facility it is always affected by weather. An underground facility is never affected by weather conditions.

Listed below are some of the specifications and attributes when considering construction build out of refrigerated food processing or refrigerated warehouse space in the greater Metropolitan St. Louis area. This underground facility is located in the southeast portion of St. Louis County and therefore has access to the Metropolitan East portion of the greater St. Louis,Missouri area.

Address: 440 Bussen Underground Road, unincorporated St. Louis County, Missouri 63129

Facility size: 119,000 total square feet. Ceiling height 24 feet. Total of 6 Truck dock doors.

Location: Greater Metropolitan St. Louis, Missouri area located in the southwest portion of unincorporated St. Louis County, Missouri and 1/2 mile from Interstate 270. Less than 5 miles from Interstate 55 and Interstate 44 highways.

Property Description: Construction proposed build out for temperature controlled distribution facility which would include cooler warehouse storage space and also refrigerated food processing areas. Ideal for repackaging and value added warehouse services for food products or food ingredients that have temperature requirements of plus 32° for cooler specifications and up to 65° humidity controlled warehouse space.

Facility Highlights: Landlord has experience in construction build out of refrigerated cold storage space, having constructed numerous cooler warehouse and freezer warehouse spaces. Also one USDA refrigerated food processing space built out.

The ambient temperature of this industrial space is 65° which results in substantially lower utility costs for refrigerating cold storage floor space. Electrical usage has a monthly cost which is constant year-round.

Employee parking adjacent office space and abundant tractor trailer parking in large common area parking lot that is adjacent to the facility.

Facility has Union Pacific Railroad service access at less than 1 mile. Mississippi River deep water barge docks less than 1 mile.

The delivery time for this type of space is dramatically and substantially less than an above ground facility.

The amount and type of tenant improvements and temperatures will affect the lease rental rate. Estimated Lease Rental Rate are available by calling Jim Cronin, a refrigerated building real estate broker at 314-994-0577 or e-mail of j.cronin@hawkds.com

Additional refrigerated warehouse buildings, temperature controlled facilities, refrigerated food processing plants and refrigerated transfer facilities (cold docks) in St. Louis, Missouri and Kansas City, Missouri and throughout the Midwest can be viewed at www.hawkds.com

Procuring Cause for Freezer or Cooler Buildings

Procuring Cause

There from time to time becomes an issue on the rightful entitlement of a real estate commission to be paid on the sale or lease transaction.

A sale or lease transaction is defined as when a Purchase Contract is signed or Lease Agreement is agreed upon.

The entitlement issue on the awarding and payment of the real estate commission is always determined by the procuring cause resulting in the sale or lease transaction.

Procuring cause shall be the primary determining factor in entitlement to compensation. Agency relationships, in and of themselves, do not determine entitlement to compensation. The agency relationship with the client and the entitlement to compensation are separate issues. A relationship with the client, or the lack a one, should only be considered in determining the procuring cause.

Many disputes will be determined by the relationship between the broker and a prospective purchaser or leasee. Consider whether, under the circumstances and in accord with local custom and practice, the broker made reasonable efforts to develop and maintain an ongoing relationship with the purchaser. Where two cooperating brokers have competing claims against a listing broker, whether the first cooperating broker actually maintained ongoing contact with the purchaser or, alternatively, whether the broker's inactivity or perceived inactivity may have caused the purchaser to reasonably conclude that the broker had lost interest or disengaged from the transaction. In other instances a purchaser, despite reasonable efforts by the broker to maintain ongoing contract, may seek assistance from another broker. Consider why the purchaser was estranged from the first broker. There may be no reason that there was an ongoing relationship between the broker and the purchaser. The issue then becomes whether the broker engaged in conduct which caused the purchaser to terminate the relationship. Among other things, by words or actions. Conduct caused a break in a series of events leading to the transaction and whether a successful transaction was actually brought about through the initiation of a separate, subsequent set of events by the second cooperating broker.

In relationship to the exclusive right to sell listings there may be from time to time disputes if a lease or a sales transaction was caused by cooperating broker and it is not clear which broker caused this sequence of events to lead to the transaction. When it is not clear, the listing broker should consult an attorney, notify the real estate commission and place the cooperating portion of the commission paid on the transaction into a non-interest bearing escrow account awaiting absolute clarification of the dispute.

In relationship to a nonexclusive listings or marketing authorization agreements the aforementioned issue with cooperating broker's still does exist and also the issue of procuring cause may also come to exist with the client of those nonexclusive listings or marketing authorization agreements.

Written by Jim Cronin, a refrigerated building real estate broker at Hawk Distribution Services, LLC and at J.Cronin@hawkds.com