Kadean Construction is building five warehouses in St. Louis amid hot industrial market
Kadean Construction has significantly expanded its industrial sector work over the past year with $327 million of new logistics facilities underway, totaling more than 6.7 million square feet at 15 locations around the country, including five in St. Louis, where the industrial market remains hot.
The Fenton-based general contractor is also constructing three industrial projects in the Kansas City area, four in Pennsylvania and one each in Maryland, Rhode Island and Virginia. All are scheduled to finish this year.
In St. Louis, Kadean is building three warehouses for an expansion of Aviator Business Park in Hazelwood, along with two warehouses at Premier 370 Business Park in St. Peters. Construction on all five of the warehouses, which range in size from 130,900 to 423,000 square feet, should finish this summer, it said.
Developer Panattoni’s latest three speculative warehouses in Aviator Business Park, located 1 mile north of St. Louis Lambert International Airport, began construction in July. Totaling $28.5 million in development, the Aviator 2 warehouse will clock in at 196,596 square feet, Aviator 5 will have 130,928 square feet and Aviator 6 measures 275,868 square feet. Kadean will also make tenant improvements as tenants sign on to the project.
The warehouses follow a previous 640,182 square feet in speculative space developed by Panattoni at the Hazelwood logistics center, also built by Kadean.
In St. Peters, Kadean has more than 800,000 square feet of speculative buildings underway for Panattoni over two warehouses, one at 423,000 square feet and another at 366,600 square feet. The projects will occupy the last open sites at the Premier 370 industrial park.
For each of the 15 industrial projects, all large Class A warehouse and distribution facilities, Kadean is incorporating sustainable design and construction features that take into account the building’s environment and the warehouse users, the company said. Most of the facilities are built with a structural steel frame, concrete tilt-up walls, thick reinforced concrete floors, high ceilings, dock positions, parking stalls for trailers and cars, and drive-up ramp dock doors for vehicle access into the building, it said.
Kadean President Mike Eveler credited the company’s industrial growth to its design-build process, which helps build lasting relationships with clients.
“Most of this industrial work comes from repeat customers that look to our depth of talent and experience to deliver comprehensive design-build services coupled with a high level of client teamwork and collaboration based on fearless communication,” Eveler said in a news release.
Kadean is growing rapidly, with annual revenues increasing by 106% to $160 million between 2018 and 2021. Revenues are expected to increase an additional 113% to $350 million in 2022, it said. Much of that growth comes from the industrial sector.
“We have achieved this sustained growth in the industrial sector and company-wide by investing heavily in our talent and technology resources,” Eveler added. “Our theme is ‘Building Bigger,’ and we are now well positioned to continue expanding our industrial footprint throughout the Midwest and beyond by utilizing strategic advantages for our clients.”
The airport submarket, which has a large concentration of warehouses, had a vacancy rate of 4.4% for the fourth quarter, with positive absorption of 867 square feet last year, according to a report from Colliers International. That means more space was leased than came on the market. The whole region had a 3.44% vacancy rate for industrial space in the fourth quarter, with positive absorption of 6 million square feet in 2021.