An Aurora business park near Denver International Airport has added 530 acres of land and plans to focus the expansion on the burgeoning e-commerce real estate market.
Majestic Realty Co. on Thursday closed on the former farmland, located directly east of the at Interstate 70 and Tower Road in Aurora.
With the expansion, the business park will span more than 1,500 acres between Tower Road and E-470 and accommodate up to 14 new buildings and 7 million square feet of new warehouse space, all specifically designed to meet the logistical needs of e-commerce users, Majestic Realty executive vice president Randy Hertel said.
“E-commerce is driving the commercial real estate industry in ways we’ve not seen before,” Hertel said in a statement. “We’re seeing greater demand in the 1 million-and-up-square-foot range with land requirements and tenant improvements slightly different than the traditional warehouse and distribution building.”
Just last month, one of Denver’s most active commercial real estate firms said in the Denver market.
This year, are expected to reach $334 billion, growing to $480 billion by 2019, according to Forrester Research.
Nearly half of all shopping this holiday season, whether browsing or buying, will be conducted online, according to .
“Companies are circling the metro market to find solutions for their e-commerce needs,” said Taylor Hazard, senior associate at Cushman & Wakefield, which represented the seller — a private family — in the Majestic deal. “It’s a question of when, not if.”
Established in 1995, Majestic Commercenter is now home to 14 industrial buildings totaling 3.5 million square feet, including a and another 450,000-square-foot warehouse set to open later this month.
Current tenants with warehouse/distribution facilities in the park include GE, Sports Authority, , Whirlpool and Anheuser-Busch.
In the expansion, four of the new e-commerce buildings would measure roughly 1 million square feet, with the rest ranging from 36,000 to 612,000 square feet.
In an interview, Hertel said the “e-Commercenter” will be developed on a build-to-suit or owner-build basis as tenants are identified. Many e-commerce users want control of the design of their buildings, often requiring greater building height, and additional parking for employees and trailers than other warehouse users, he said.
“We’re seeing them in most of our major markets,” Hertel said. “It represents a huge percentage of buildings under construction in the United States.”
Over the past two years, Majestic Realty itself has delivered five 1 million-square-feet-or-larger e-commerce facilities for major retailers, including Walmart, across the country.
, a California-based real estate company with regional offices in Denver, is the largest privately owned industrial developer in the U.S.
“We understand Denver, from a population standpoint, isn’t an L.A. or Atlanta or New Jersey area, but there’s enough of a population base to still warrant the Walmarts of the world, the Amazons of the world to come into the greater Denver-Aurora area and set up shop,” Hertel said.
Wendy Mitchell, CEO of the Aurora Economic Development Council, said as far as it knows, there are no other developers in the area specifically targeting e-commerce right now.
“If you look at the clients they have in their Rolodex, the fact that Majestic just bought this section of land and are developing and dedicating it just to e-commerce is huge for Aurora,” Mitchell said. “The first big (e-commerce business) you get, the others come and cluster around them. The most important one is the first one.”
Emilie Rusch: 303-954-2457, erusch@denverpost.com or @emilierusch
