Revere Mayor Brian Arrigo announced Amazon will be opening a distribution center in the former Necco factory near Revere Beach Parkway in the city.
“Amazon’s historic investment in our community will invigorate our local economy and promote the city of Revere as a place where prominent, innovation driven businesses are welcome and can thrive,” Arrigo wrote on his official Facebook page.
The distribution center will employ 600 to 800 people and is expected to open by spring 2020, Arrigo told Banker & Tradesman. Revere has not offered the developers or Amazon any financial incentives, Arrigo said. The company estimates its investment in capital improvements at $30 million to $40 million, he said.
An Amazon spokesman said the facility will serve the e-commerce giant’s last-mile delivery services in the Suffolk County area, including the use of independent contractors delivering for Amazon Flex.
Amazon has not indicated the estimated vehicle trips generated by the operation, but will submit a traffic management plan to the city, Arrigo said.
“What they’ve talked about is they have waves of deliveries that happen over the course of a day, with an interest in off-peak hours if there is such a thing now,” he said.
Amazon’s arrival will renew the city’s push for a new MBTA commuter rail station on the Rockport line which runs past the property, Arrigo said.
The site had previously been looked at as a potential home for the wholesalers of the New Boston Food Market in Widett Circle, an area long eyed by commercial developers.
Framingham-based Atlantic Management and VMD Cos. of Andover, bought the 50-acre Revere property in 2018 for $54.6 million and refinanced their original $69.6 million mortgage with a $115 million bridge loan from Loancore Capital Credit REIT in January 2019 to pay for capital improvements and tenant fitouts.
As the largest single industrial vacancy in Massachusetts’ increasingly tight industrial market, the building attracted widespread interest, according to real estate sources. It includes single-story, high-bay warehouse space and 2-story manufacturing and distribution space. The factory, completed in 1982, has 800,000 square feet in total.
Revere city councilors rezoned the property in 2018 for additional uses including life science manufacturing, R&D, retail sales and service, warehouse and distribution.
Newmark Knight Frank was the leasing agent for ownership.
Round Hill Investments, which bought Necco, shut down the candy factory in mid-2018.
