CHICAGO—The Chicago area industrial market has recently experienced a noticeable bump in activity, including a boost in investment and a decline in the vacancy rates of many submarkets. And the better economic conditions may have had an even bigger impact on certain sectors, such as food production or packaging, that typically have to expand in good times and bad, due to the growing population.

“We're seeing many more food-related users,” Barry Missner, the president of the Missner Group, tells GlobeSt.com. As reported yesterday in GlobeSt.com, the Skokie, IL-based real estate developer, is putting the finishing touches on the $35 million repurposing of a 532,560-square-foot industrial building at 1001 W. Crossroads Parkway in suburban Romeoville for Peacock Engineering Co., a specialist in food packaging. Located in Prologis Park 55, it was the second largest industrial lease in the I-55 corridor during 2013.       

“It's an always-growing industry,” Missner adds, but the economic crisis derailed a lot of plans, and “maybe, there is now a lot of pent-up demand for capital expenditures.”

“There's certainly a lot more activity than we've seen in past years,” says Drue Stoehr, project manager of the Peacock repurpose. “This sector is seeing well above-average activity, of that I'm certain.”

Missner's task with the Peacock project was to quickly get the space operational. “We worked up to three shifts a day and basically every weekend,” Stoehr says, at least from May to October, when roughly 75% of the necessary work got done, a phase that normally would have taken a year.

The building, originally built in 1999, had been occupied by Gillette, which used it as a dry-storage warehouse, which in turn meant Missner had a lot of work to do. “I wouldn't say this type of project is unique, but the size and scope of it are unique,” says Missner. The company had to place about 60 refrigeration units on the roof, for example, and “these warehouses are not typically designed for those loads.” Therefore, in addition to placing the units, the company had to strengthen the building's supports.

“We also had to tear up a substantial amount of flooring, about 120,000-square-feet, put in a great deal of new piping, a new freezer floor, and then do a full pour back,” says Stoehr. In October, the company downshifted to a normal pace. It is putting the finishing touches on the building's production rooms and should complete the project this June.

The frenetic pace of those early months would have been impossible without help from municipal officials, Missner adds. They worked with the company to ensure that the needed permits were submitted and approved without impeding the work. “That's something that can hold a project back. But Romeoville's cooperation was critical.”