Everything is Logistics

The State of Warehousing in 2023 with Wagner Logistics

April 11, 2023 Blythe Brumleve
Everything is Logistics
The State of Warehousing in 2023 with Wagner Logistics
Show Notes Transcript

In this episode of "Everything is Logistics," host Blythe Brumleve interviews Joe Oliaro, VP of Sales and Chief Real Estate Officer at Wagner Logistics, about the state of warehousing.

Oliaro outlines his company's history and growth, which has been primarily focused on contract logistics in support of manufacturing groups, as well as their current size and expansion plans. The conversation covers topics such as technology in warehousing, labor shortages, and the impact of e-commerce on the industry.

LINKS: 



WHAT YOU'LL LEARN:

The listener will learn about the increased demand for warehouse space due to e-commerce and just-in-time inventory depletion during the pandemic, the current state of industrial warehouse space availability in the US, the challenges of building warehouses to meet incoming demand, the shift in the industrial market properties in Arizona towards heated and cooled warehouses, the challenges of recruiting and retaining warehouse employees, the benefits of shared warehouse space and equipment, the role of Wagner in providing logistics management services for warehouse and distribution operations, and the importance of having a strong real estate partner.


TIMESTAMPS: 

[00:01:30] Wagner Logistics' history and growth.

[00:04:09] Supply chain challenges during pandemic.

[00:08:12] Industrial real estate trends.

[00:13:27] Abandoned properties for manufacturing.

[00:19:25] Warehouse work has changed.

[00:20:25] E-commerce industry turnover.

[00:24:22] Automation in manufacturing.

[00:28:24] Rail as a strong selling point.

[00:34:19] Real estate challenges for warehousing.

[00:36:45] Real estate value and research.


---------------------------------------------

THANK YOU TO OUR SPONSORS!


Are you experienced in freight sales or already an independent freight agent? Listen to our Freight Agent Trenches interview series powered by SPI Logistics to hear directly from the company's agents on how they took the leap and found a home with SPI freight agent program.


Tai TMS is designed to streamline your brokerage operations and propel growth for both FTL and LTL shipment cycles. Book a demo with the Tai team today and tell them Everything is Logistics sent you


Maximize your website’s performance as a sales tool with Digital Dispatch’s website management.

Blythe Brumleve:

Welcome into another episode of everything is logistics a podcast for the thinkers in freight. I am your host Blythe Brumleve. And I'm happy to welcome in Joe Oliaro, VP of sales and cheif real estate officer at Wagner logistics and we're going to be talking about the state of warehousing. Joe, did I first of all, welcome into the show, but did I just butcher your last name?

Joe Oliaro:

Well, you were pretty darn close. I'll give you that. I've heard I've heard Alia Rio I've heard all kinds of stuff. So it's same stuff different day, that's what I've started having to do is put my name phonetically next to my signature line. And that typically helps people out but you're pretty close. Oh, the arrow is

Blythe Brumleve:

the arrow. Okay. Okay, so I was kind of close, but not exactly there. And as somebody with a challenging first and last name. I found that even like adding phonetic spelling just doesn't work because people don't even know where to start with mine. So we're in the same boat. Okay, so So Joe, for folks who may not be aware of you have Wagner logistics, give us kind of a sense of of who you are, how you you found yourself working in this industry. And then ultimately how you started your your company.

Joe Oliaro:

Oh, man. So Wagner logistics has been around since 1946. So 77 years, started out as Wagner cartidge service, helping with transportation that morphed into warehousing. And here we are today, occupying roughly 7 million square feet across 24 different markets in the US. From 2015 to 2020. We doubled in size. And we're on track to redouble again. And most of that warehousing activities through contract logistics, in support of manufacturing groups that though, they basically have us run the DC for them, they bring in raw materials, we store those in the DC we shuttle them to the manufacturer or the factory finished goods come back out and then we we hold them there and then send them on down the supply chain. So that's kind of where we've made our our bones in the warehousing industry. And we've been a running successful top 103 pl for the last 21 years.

Blythe Brumleve:

Nice. And so it's to give I guess, folks kind of a an understanding of what your I guess customer segments look like? Is it? Is it any refrigerated warehouses temperature controlled? Anything like that? Or is it mainly just those manufacturing supplies?

Joe Oliaro:

Um, it's mainly just those manufacturing suppliers were heavy in the paper industry. We worked in automotive, we work in the energy sector, we worked with plastics in the past, and most of the most of the warehouses are ambient. So we don't have any, you know, cold storage facilities or anything like that. But we've, we've kind of found a niche in what we do. And it's a lot of pallet in Pallet out type activity, and we become incredibly efficient at that.

Blythe Brumleve:

Awesome. Yeah, that's super interesting, because I would just imagine that for Well, I guess I can't really imagine because that was gonna be my next question is kind of give us a baseline of, you know, because over the last few years, I don't have to tell anybody that listens to the show, or even you that, you know, obviously the market has changed dramatically. It's like a pendulum that's that's shifting from from back and forth. With the rise of you know, ecommerce deliveries during the last few years and overwhelming demand for warehouse space give us a sense of what the warehouse market looked like before all of this craziness entered the market.

Joe Oliaro:

So manufacturers shippers loved just in time inventory, prior to the pandemic, they loved, you know, having a minimal warehouse footprint, and as soon as the pandemic hit their volume, or I guess their demand increased by 30%, in some cases, so it was it was immediately there just in time inventory was immediately depleted. And they had to come up with another solution. And so the warehouse market was already tight. So they had to figure something out, there's a little well, let's go and find some three PL partners that might have might be able to set aside some space or help us with more efficiency to you know, create more more space within our warehouse or in their warehouse. So we've been dealing with that level of demand for last couple years and it's it's created a paradigm shift in how these companies look, look at their supply chain, and it's really put a spotlight on the value of procurement and and best practices for supply chain managers across the country.

Blythe Brumleve:

And so when we think about, you know, everything that was, you know, I guess the the Justin time model to you know, fast forward to today, is it kind of safe to say that they don't necessarily need that model anymore?

Joe Oliaro:

Yes, well, I don't know, if they don't need that model anymore, they still want that model, but they also want extra overflow space and extra, maybe what we call it an extra 30 days of inventory on on hand so that they have that much extra time to react to fluctuations in the market demand. And so I think there's still a lot of things in question two, as far as how consumers are starting to shake out of this.

Blythe Brumleve:

So yeah, cuz it almost feels like it's still you know, it put ecommerce on on steroids for a while, which, you know, just created this massive amount of storage demand for for a lot of these retailers out here. But I imagine a lot of that has sort of settled in, but it's still, you know, this settling in is still significantly higher than then 2019 levels. Is that a fair assumption?

Joe Oliaro:

Yeah, I would agree with that. And I think here in the last year, and going forward, you know, we're there, people are starting to talk about an influx of onshoring. Back to the US, which is going to have a major effect on, on jobs on the vacancy for industrial warehouse across the country. And just another, you know, another another bone to throw or another monkey wrench to throw in the engine to to cause further disruption.

Blythe Brumleve:

Let's actually dive into into that a little bit more, because I'm actually really fascinated with that, you know, the nearshoring. And efforts that are going on within manufacturing. What is the I guess the, I guess, the current space level of space that's available? If I'm a retailer, if I'm a manufacturer, and I'm looking for space? Is it easy to come by? Or is it very challenging and expensive to come by?

Joe Oliaro:

So so if you're looking in the top 50 markets across the country, you are most likely at a sub 5% vacancy. Now what that means is, there's less than 5% of the industrial product in that market available and vacant ready for a tenant. Now, if you're looking in Dallas, I was just in Dallas a couple of weeks ago. And if you're planning to take down a warehouse space, or if you're a three PL looking to serve as a contract, the timing of that is critical. Because there's so much product industrial product coming out of the ground, that if you're looking for it tomorrow, there might be something available today. But if you're trying to plan for q4, you might be in trouble. Because you don't know exactly what's going to come out of the ground, you don't know exactly what's going to be available. And frankly, you don't know what rates are going to look like. Let's see in you know, if you're in the Inland Empire, there's virtually no space available. And so we've started looking to buildings that are closer to our facilities, and like Tracy and Stockton, where the rates aren't as crazy. There is some sort of availability and it's not a top 50 market. But it's it's close enough from a tertiary standpoint to say, hey, we can probably meet your needs here and save you some money on occupancy costs. And then, for as far as onshoring goes it, you know, over the next five years there are 68 metro markets in the US and Canada that will see an additional 10 million square feet or more of new industrial facilities, and that's mainly manufacturing. So cities in the Sunbelt and Midwest that are close to rail, and port facilities are most likely to keep or see these types of developments. So you're gonna see a shift away from the east and west coast and I think you're gonna see a major, a major influx of manufacturing activity, you know, into the Midwest and in that area. I saw a map of mega projects across the US and you know, it's, it's, it's even siloed into, you know, these lithium ion batteries, automotive data centers, which aren't necessarily for warehousing but, you know, it's taking up a lot of the bandwidth for large space that could be used for fulfillment or warehouse distribution.

Blythe Brumleve:

This episode is brought to you by SPI logistics the premier freight agent and logistics network in North America. Are you currently building your freight brokerages, book a business and feel that your capabilities are being limited due to lack of support and access to adequate technology? At SPI logistics, we have the technology, the systems and the back office support to help you succeed. If you're looking to take control of your financial future and build your own business, with the backing of one of the most successful logistics firms in North America, visit SPI three pl.com to learn more. So what happens whenever you're noticing, you know, you as a company versus you know, a manufacturer they notice, you know, the, you know, the 5% or less amount of space that you can, you know, actively use right now, versus the demand that's coming in the future? Why wouldn't a lot of these manufacturers just build their own warehouse? I imagine there's much more to it, but that's where I was hoping that you can kind of clarify on on why they wouldn't.

Joe Oliaro:

Why they why they wouldn't do onshoring or what

Blythe Brumleve:

why they wouldn't build their own sites, you they see all the complexities that are going on in the market right now. If they maybe want to guarantee that flexibility in the future, why wouldn't they just go out and you know, buy up their own land and buy up their own, you know, or build up their own warehouse?

Joe Oliaro:

Well, I think that's what a lot of these manufacturers are doing. They're going out finding land in the Midwest, you know, you got you got, I'll use Kansas City, for example, on east and west of Kansas City proper, you've got nothing but farmland and nothing but developable space. The challenge with building out warehouse in conjunction with that, especially from a developer standpoint, is construction costs. Available labor for construction materials, and lead time on materials and equipment is killer. And so what we're seeing now is developers saying, Hey, we're going to cut our pipeline of development activity relative to warehouse and half. And we're gonna go from a $500 billion development pipeline to 250, across the country. And it's, it's it's almost a paradox, because you've got all this incoming demand of manufacturers who will need warehouse. But then you've also got all these challenges from labor, construction cost material, lead times that are working against building warehouse to facilitate that need. So I don't know where that lands, but it's, it's going to be an interesting, you know, next two, three years. Let's see how that all shakes out.

Blythe Brumleve:

It's almost like that maybe some of the home builders it may be very similar to to what's going on in like home construction, where a lot of the home builders are limiting construction, because demand is falling. But there's, you know, a lot of you know, intricacies within each of those different segments, but it kind of sounds like both of them are trying to control their own supply and demand or maybe manufacture that supply and demand.

Joe Oliaro:

Yeah, absolutely. I think where you're going to see a shift would potentially be, you know, taking abandoned properties. So manufacturers could take abandoned facilities, closer to the urban core, and redeveloping those taking old, you know, functionally obsolete warehouses and raising the roof literally raising the roof five feet to make it more marketable, to make it more functional. And that in some cases, that's more cost effective than tearing down and rebuilding a space or going out and doing a build to suit.

Blythe Brumleve:

Oh, wow, that's interesting. Why only five feet? Why wouldn't they extend it? You know, maybe another? I don't know. 20 or 30 feet?

Joe Oliaro:

Sorry, you broke up there for a second? Oh,

Blythe Brumleve:

I was asking why only? Why only five feet? Why would they extend it? Maybe like 30 or 40 feet?

Joe Oliaro:

Yeah, you know, I think we've reached a point where 40 feet is the maximum today but you know, I think five, six years ago, they said well, we'll never go over. We'll never go over 32 feet we'll never have a need for that. But now you see cold storage facilities that have well over 40 feet that's completely automated. The robots know where to go they go up the thing they grab the frozen food or whatever it is bring it back down and send it on out so it's yeah it's it's it's all demand driven all Hey, how can we remove the you know, the labor element out of out of this as well and it's funny. Sorry, I'm going off on a tangent here. But but the so in Arizona 1520 years ago, there was a you know substantial amount of income Throw product out there, it's a great centralized location to serve as California, which is typically more expensive, more regulated. So Phoenix, Arizona is perfect for facilitating stuff into California. And what's happened, the product out there has had went from only 20% had maybe HVAC in the warehouses. And some cases, they do something like a swamp cooler, that was very an antique way of cooling off a warehouse. Now, it's completely flipped, and now maybe 20% is left like that. And now you've got 80% of the industrial market properties in Arizona that are, you know, heated and cooled. And it's not because of the products that they're storing, we know it's hot. And in Phoenix, Arizona, it's not because of the products, it's because of the labor, that's the only way they can get employees to come in and work in those buildings, because you're gonna not. And so we're also seeing a shift and how you cater to labor. And if you can spend an extra, you know,$100,000 a year and increase your retention by 20%. It makes a huge difference.

Blythe Brumleve:

Yeah, that's actually interesting, I wouldn't have even thought about it from that aspect. But it makes a ton of sense, like who you're obviously going to face some hiring challenges. If you can't, if your building is over 100 degrees in the summertime, they hardly anyone wants to work in those kinds of conditions. And so knowing, you know, sort of the the customer expectations, the demand levels of where they are right now. And in the coming years, where does Wagner place their bets? Where are they, you know, sort of sitting in the market? And where are they placing their bets for in the future.

Joe Oliaro:

So we're taking a targeted approach, we've identified, say, 10, different markets across our portfolio where we want to double, triple quadruple our footprint in those markets. And those are markets where we feel like we have a strong presence, I guess, a strong market of manufacturing presence, a decent labor market. And then, you know, enough industrial product, to give us the ability to have some level of flexibility in in our real estate options. And with my background, being in real estate, I know that being able to pit landlords against each other is a big deal. And if you're in New Jersey, or the Inland Empire, you don't have that option, there are no vacancies, you are at the mercy of the landlord. And there's a lot of good landlords out there. But they're, they're, you know, they're, they're taking what they can today, because they might not get it tomorrow. So it, we're taking that targeted approach into these markets. From a labor standpoint, you know, we've had to shift the way that we appeal to employees and, and you know, it's a balance, because we're also trying to fulfill our contracts and complete our service level agreements. And that's required us to go in higher temp services. To hire enough employees, we've sped up the hiring process by eliminating initial drug testing upfront. And that's a whole thing in of itself, because if you take too long to hire the employee, there's enough demand for that employee out there that if you don't snatch them up that day, you might not get a response back from them at all. And so we've quantified recruiting, just recruiting one warehouse employee is $1,000 Wow. So if we're constantly recruiting these these folks, it's, it's, you know, it just eats us alive. So we have to get better at not just recruiting but retaining those employees. So measuring measures to bolster employee satisfaction and improve that retention is, you know, top of our list. And then once we have an employee on, you know, a lot of it's about onboarding, proper training and giving them a really good orientation to understand what their role is and how they contribute to the success of the company. 30 years ago, you know, warehousemen were big, tough burly men that that moved big sacks of grain around and you know, hammered boxes together and shifted, you know, through it on a on a on a rail on a rail car and that's, that's what it was perceived to be 30 years ago. It's not like that anymore. You know, it's a very diverse community of people that like working in a warehouse, but they also want to have that direction, they want to have that work life balance. And they want to be recognized for the good things that they do.

Blythe Brumleve:

And I think, too, that that's, that's sort of shining a light on, you know, just the warehouse workers themselves, the people that are responsible for helping you get those items, you know, within a couple of days, you know, I think I heard or I read that Amazon had a memo in the middle of like the the COVID pandemic, when ecommerce demand is just skyrocketing high, that they were legitimately worried that they were going to run out of workers that they could potentially not the workers that they've hired, or maybe already hired in the past, but they were legitimately worried that they were going to run out of folks that they could even recruit, to come and work inside their warehouses, because they have, you know, so many throughout the country. So how does you know, how do you even think about competitor competing with, you know, the likes of like an Amazon, I imagine, if you treat your employees halfway decent, you're probably half the way there.

Joe Oliaro:

Yeah, and, you know, statistics would show you that the E commerce industry in general. And you know, Amazon covers a large portion of the industry that it's a the E commerce sector is a meat grinder, when it comes to, you know, attrition and employee turnover, it's just a constant. I mean, it's, it's almost 50%. So you're constantly seeing new people coming in and out of your facility. And it's incredibly difficult to manage successfully, because you're constantly having to retrain, and you're having to change the roles to where they're more simplified, more of a push button, hey, go pick this up, put it over there. And that's where some like automation comes into play. Because if you can automate the process itself to tell the employees where to go, it takes part of the training out of it. So I think from an E commerce standpoint, that's there's more of a demand for automation to make it easier to bring people in, because there's so much turnover from our standpoint, you know, we look at automation and from more of a, setting up a roadmap of automation for our customers, rather than trying to address labor issues. So it's more like, Hey, we're gonna start out, we're not going to fully automate this facility today. But we're going to show you, here's your first step, here's here's your long travels within the warehouse, here's, here's your repetitive moves. That that we think that we can automate, to support and make it a better experience for employees so that they're able to be cross trained across different roles, they're able to really understand how the warehouse works without making it too complicated.

Blythe Brumleve:

Do you wish there was a central place to pull in all of your social media posts, recruit employees, and give potential customers a glimpse into how you operate your business? Well, all of this should already be on your website. But too often, we hand that responsibility of building our online home off to a cousin, a neighbor's kid down the street, or a stranger across the world. Digital dispatch believes in building a better website at a fraction of the costs that those big time marketing agencies would charge. Because we've spent years on those digital front lines, our experienced team focuses on the modern web technologies to bring in all of the places you're already active online, show off those customer success stories, and measure the ROI of it all in one place. With manage website plans, starting at $90 a month, head on over to digital dispatch.io to see how we can build your digital ecosystem on a strong foundation. We've got explainer videos right on the website and the ability to book a demo immediately find it all over at Digital dispatch.io Now I know that you know for a lot of your customers, they're they're more on the manufacturing side of things. So they're probably bigger items, you know, bulkier items, things like or I guess more awkward, not awkwardly shaped, but you you get what I'm saying it's not a nice and neat little you know, ecommerce boxes, that's great for shipping. So with that in mind, how are you or maybe not focusing on you know, it's like the automation robotics things that are you know, very popular in sort of the E commerce driven world, but is that really applicable to you know, that the manufacturing side of things?

Joe Oliaro:

Yeah, I think it really boils down to what the what the customer wants, and really what they what they need to be able to handle for their for their volumes and demand and so in some of the in a Every market in the top 50. In every market, there's labor challenges, and if and it really boils down to labor costs. So you know, a lot of three, pls estimated labor was going to escalate by maybe 5%. Year over year, five years ago, it's done more like eight to 10% a year. So you've had this increase in labor costs. And then you've had a decrease in automation and technology and some of the things that are coming across the table. So you've got these two lines that are going to converge. And the play to our customers is, hey, let's find where that line converges. Let's plan around that specifically. And then we'll, we'll be able to put a plan together so that we're mitigating how much you're paying with labor. But you know, we're also not throwing the baby out with the bathwater, we're we're able to, rather than have this big dynamic rollercoaster of costs, we've got an even keel of cost that still covers the customer's demand,

Blythe Brumleve:

which is a smart play, in my opinion, because it's automation only makes sense where it makes sense, I think for for a lot of folks, if they just want to add automation, just for the sake of saying that they have automation, and that software, your processes, and technology that is outdated within just a couple of years, and you just spent all that time and energy and money into, you know, investing in those platforms. And then they are out of date within just a couple of years. And so you kind of have to find that really sweet spot, like you said, of marrying sort of the worker relationship with all of these different technology trends that are that are coming into the space. And another one of the aspects that that you guys tackle and I was reading is that you have a sort of a shared relationship between the tenants within the warehouse, can you kind of speak to, you know, some of the pros and cons of having a tenant relationship, or maybe, I guess, a roommate situation with a lot of your warehouse clients?

Joe Oliaro:

Yeah, so we call it our flexible warehousing solutions or our multi customer warehouses. And we've developed a program that allows manufacturers maybe on a smaller scale, or still a dedicated opportunity, but they're basically sharing the space across a handful of shippers, manufacturers versus having one dedicated facility, the benefit there is that you're able to take advantage of the shared space, you're taking advantage of shared equipment and shared labor, across the across that building cross that operation. And so in most cases, there's some level of seasonality across those customers. And so we're constantly trying to do is reduce that customers occupancy cost by leveraging complementary customers that will come in and like let's say, one customer has an initial bill that goes through June, and then they start to deplete their inventory. Well, if we have another customer that has a bill that begins in June or July, then it's kind of a ying and yang thing where we're we're able to keep concrete covered, and we're able to keep them from paying too much for space.

Blythe Brumleve:

That makes a ton of sense. Because I think there's another aspect to it. And I think that's, you know, a good fit for especially a lot of your manufacturing, you know, clients is the aspect that you guys also build next to you have a real component that is a very strong selling point for a lot of your warehouse locations. Why is that for folks who may not be aware of the advantages of rail?

Joe Oliaro:

So rail itself is is it's it's been around forever. You can carry three to four truckloads of product in one in one rail car efficiencies over an intermodal you're avoiding Dre, Dre edge and box termination. And you know, it's more cost effective over longer distances. And then if the volumes are there with manufacturers, you can save additional transportation. And the more volume you have, the more the railroad is going to work with you as well. We've known railroads to come in and build a spur knowing that they're going to get a lot more volume from from your, your group specifically. The challenge is that you know, because of the longer lead time on rail transportation, you know, it requires more planning to really realize those savings. So understanding when you need to receive the product and allowing enough time to kind of build that infrastructure into your plan is is a big deal.

Blythe Brumleve:

Yeah, I just actually had a conversation with Martin Liu over at contracts and he was talking about, you know, the end claiming benefits are sort of the future of rail being trans loading and how all of these different components can really help you save a ton of cash on your shipping, which, you know, shipping can be upwards of 50% of your overall, you know, budget for the company overall. And so if you can save just a few percentage points on your shipping costs, you know, by shipping via rail, then that has a significant downstream effect, as far as as your savings are concerned. And so when you so say I'm a customer, and I want to come in, I want to do business with with Wagner and I want you guys to take over as far as or maybe not even take over, maybe handle that aspect of, you know, the storage and the shipment of my goods. Where does Wagner play a role? Are you just the, you know, the, I guess, the real estate location? Or are you providing all of those logistics management services, the you know, coordinating transportation, coordinating the rail? What are you guys doing, and what what do your customers you know, need the most help with.

Joe Oliaro:

So we, I guess, the two main parts of our business would come from sourcing the warehouse, implementing the operation at the warehouse and distribution operation itself, and then also facilitating any transportation needs, that would come off of our docks, that's where we really provide a lot of value, obviously, we have value added services would be comparable to any other three PL. But I feel like we have a competitive advantage on on the real estate side, just knowing how those transactions play out different contacts that we've made throughout the country. And, and but the means by which we go out and source, new real estate opportunities, we kind of have a good rhythm down and a good way of, you know, moving quickly, to take down space, and a lot of our customers see a lot of value in that, because they have to go through a lot of red tape, they have to go through legal, they have to go through all these different things, you know, especially if they're like a fortune 500 company to to navigate, and really negotiate a deal. And if you're taking that long, you put yourself in a position to be, you know, competing against other tenants for space. And these days, it's it makes it really difficult to get a below market or even, you know, to try to avoid a horse race for a building. If that's the case,

Blythe Brumleve:

well, how would I guess these customers avoiding that, you know, we kind of talked about sort of the I guess the the crunch as far as space availability, and then it's probably only going to get worse from here on out. So how are you helping maybe your some of your clients tackle those who maybe be it maybe you're working in an industry that is experiencing an unreal amount of demand, not only now but maybe in the future?

Joe Oliaro:

You know, it's it's, we've taken a look at customers existing facilities and shown them how to reduce I guess how to maximize the cube in their warehouse. For instance, we we looked at a facility with a customer, and they had normal racking in place or in their plan. And we showed them that by instituting Very Narrow Aisle racking with a certain level of automation, they'd be able to reduce their footprint in that space by 60%. So it's it's also getting creative with the existing existing space you have. And then, you know, in some cases where we have to go and take down a facility, you might have to settle a little bit for a lesser, less than ideal type location or, you know, provide some upfit in the space to make it work or make it be more functional. We've run across a few different locations where the dock doors are not an ideal size. So we had to figure out what that was going to cost up fifth the dock doors, and in some cases, it's not cheap.

Blythe Brumleve:

Oh, yeah, I can imagine that, that you know, those unforeseen circumstances, those unforeseen costs are probably you know, existing with any new building, maybe that you invest in in the future. So for folks who may want to continue following the journey, as far as like, you know, warehousing and storage capacity are concerned, you know, what does, I guess, maybe the five next five years look like? Or is it impossible to even sort of gauge that out right now?

Joe Oliaro:

You know, it is tough. I think it's tough to look further out than like 18 months, five years, I don't know where we'll be in five years. But, you know, what was I? So, I guess, sticking on the rail, because I'm all about rail. Right now. We're all always trying to find direct real serve space. And as far as real estate challenges for the next five years, there's going to be there's already In virtually 0% vacancy flat rents their space and if it comes on the market, it's off the market. Within a few days, in some cases, we were just competing for a space here in Kansas City. And we had to step away because the group wanted, they offered a 10 year deal, just just because it had rail come into it. Wow. So it's, and that's a paradox too, because you have rail serve space directs it rail, sort of warehouse buildings. But from a landlord standpoint, there's no additional value that comes from having rail coming to the building, appraisers will not grant an additional credit or value to the building because of real estate. And it's crazy to me, but when you have such a nice use of that building, with rail coming in, they, they can't justify adding value to it. Now, if you're asking me for a prediction, I think over the next five years, you're gonna see that change, and you're gonna see intermodal facilities began to overflow, and you're going to see companies pay a major premium moreso than they are today, for rail service, direct rail service space,

Blythe Brumleve:

because it almost sounds like you're you're allowing yourself to have guaranteed capacity, or at least guaranteed movement of your goods or the flexibility, at least, that's a little shocking, that, you know, the appraiser wouldn't add any value to that it speaks to maybe a fundamental misunderstanding of the value of of something like that of what it would provide to a building into an area. Yeah. So for folks, oh, go ahead.

Joe Oliaro:

I was just gonna say I would, I would go and lobby for it. But if they did add value to the property, it would only it would not serve my interests.

Blythe Brumleve:

I would only complicate maybe things for you. So well, actually, how do you guys find out about if a building becomes available? And if do you just have to go by and look or look them up on Google Maps? Or how do you how do you do that part of the research process, in order to make that investment,

Joe Oliaro:

we have, we have really, we have a really strong real estate partner. And so it's, you know, I was real estate's kind of the wild wild west still, it's like the last remaining frontier of information protection. So it's it all deals are done on information that's, that's available, and you by knowing more than the other than the landlord or knowing more than the tenant, you can put yourself in a much better position to win and capitalize on that knowledge. So it's, it's always been that way, but the because of Death of Distance, because of you know, digital information access, and really better information, it's taken the value of just that one broker, knowing what's going on in that market. And so they've had to, they've had to step it up and provide better reporting on you know, site selection information, like what your state and local taxes tax incentives would be. What the labor markets in that area look like where you know, the where the new buildings are going to come out of the ground, what kind of relationships they have, that might give us a first position in noting in negotiations. So it's, it's ever evolving, but it's it's, it's not just hey, I know a guy who has a building that I can lease to you it's gotten more complicated than that.

Blythe Brumleve:

It almost sounds like you have to hire like private investigators in order to to find out you know, the scoop on each of these projects. That's not far off. All right, Joe, where I guess it you know, for folks or customers who may be looking for you know, storage solutions, a right now or in the near future and want to get in touch with Wagner and find out everything that you guys got going on? Where Can folks you know, follow more of your work and maybe, you know, check out your site and you know, get access to some of that available space.

Joe Oliaro:

Yeah, you can find us on LinkedIn, find us on our web website, Wagner logistics.com. Find me on LinkedIn, you can Yeah, we're out there on the socials. And we're, we're moving and shaking so always always looking to have good conversations and help people with their warehousing.

Blythe Brumleve:

Awesome. Well, I think this was a really great conversation to have, especially around the wild, wild west aspect of of buying up locations in order to ensure that you at least have some kind of storage capabilities. So appreciate your time, Joe, and we'd love to have you back on the show in the future. Hopefully, the market is in, you know, a little bit less of a challenging situation than what, you know, we all kind of find ourselves in. But then that's, that's logistics. So,

Joe Oliaro:

yeah, well, I appreciate you having me out. And I look forward to revisiting this conversation and be apologizing for how wrong I am.

Blythe Brumleve:

I know in the five years, I'm gonna set a date, and we're gonna say, hey, all these predictions were wrong. And these were right, and this is what we're gonna bet on in the future. All right, perfect. I hope you enjoy this episode of everything is logistics, a podcast for the thinkers in freight, telling the stories behind how your favorite stuff and people get from point A to B. If you liked this episode, do me a favor and sign up for our newsletter. I know what you're probably thinking, oh God, another newsletter. But it's the easiest way to stay updated when new episodes are released. Plus, we drop a lot of gems in that email to help the one person marketing team and folks like yourself who are probably wearing a lot of hats at work in order to help you navigate this digital world a little bit easier. You could find that email signup link along with our socials in past episodes. Over at everything is logistics.com And until next time, I'm Blake and go Jags