Chemical distributor inks Richmond lease

Published April 4, 2019 by Michael O'Connor

A chemical distributor is spilling into Richmond’s industrial market.

Brenntag Mid-South Inc. has a five-year lease for a 28,000-square-foot warehouse at 738 Goodes St. in Richmond, says John East, a division manager for the chemical distributor.

East says Brenntag is working now to get the warehouse ready to distribute ingredients in chemical products. He says plans call for hiring five or six people as either drivers or warehouse workers.

The new Richmond facility is a long time coming, East says. Prior to the Richmond expansion,  Brenntag has served the market from Durham, N.C., for years. East says Brenntag needed a warehouse closer to its customers in Virginia.

Brenntag’s Richmond warehouse will serve around a 150-mile footprint that roughly spans the coast, Farmville and Fredericksburg. The company opened its first outpost in Virginia about 40 years ago in Bedford, East says.

Richmond’s industrial market had a 4.2 percent overall vacancy rate in the fourth quarter of 2018, according to a Cushman & Wakefield | Thalhimer report.

Thalhimer’s Evan M. Magrill worked on the lease negotiations for Brenntag’s Richmond facility.