Amazon Leases Another Philly Warehouse, Approaches 10M SF In Greater Philly Area
From Central Delaware to the Lehigh Valley, Amazon has leased enough warehouse space to fit several Center City skyscrapers.
The e-commerce giant has agreed to lease a 66K SF warehouse at 13200 Townsend Road in Northeast Philadelphia from Abrams Realty, the Philadelphia Business Journal reports. The transaction, in which Colliers Senior Managing Director Richard Gorodesky represented local owner Abrams, marks Amazon's 22nd lease in the Greater Philadelphia area.
Including the Townsend Road property, Amazon leases four buildings within Philadelphia city limits, the PBJ said: three in Northeast Philadelphia and one near Philadelphia International Airport in Southwest Philadelphia. Amazon occupies 17 distribution centers totaling 5.2M SF in total across the Philly metro, including South Jersey and the New Castle submarket of North Delaware.
Among those 17 buildings, 13 have been marked by Amazon as last-mile distribution centers totaling 2.3M SF. Amazon distinguishes last-mile distribution centers from what it calls "fulfillment centers" based on their positions within its logistics network, though some warehouses it considers last-mile are larger than some designated as fulfillment centers.
Including four fulfillment centers in the Lehigh Valley and one 1M SF warehouse in the Middletown submarket of Central Delaware, Amazon's logistics footprint in the region stands at 9.6M SF as of the signing of the Townsend Road lease, according to the PBJ. That number is likely to rise again before long, given the target of 1,500 new distribution centers Amazon set in September.
Across all of its property interests, Amazon leases 454M SF worldwide and owns 20M SF, with just under 300M SF within the U.S., according to the company's most recent quarterly earnings report.
Though its apparent interest in warehouses smaller than 100K SF is likely intriguing for owners without gigantic, institutional portfolios, its insatiable appetite may lead it to go bigger when Hilco Redevelopment Partners begins to deliver the millions of square feet it has promised at the site of the former PES refinery.
