Modern Materials Handling - December 2011

Every year, Modern takes anannual roll call of the Top20 third-party logistics (3PL)warehouses to see who’s at thehead of the class in regard to total squarefootage of storage space.This year, we have once again calledupon Dick Armstrong, chair of Armstrong& Associates, who closely follows the 3PLsector of the warehousing industry, for hisinsight. In addition to sorting out the list,Armstrong tells Modern that the NorthAmerican 3PL warehousing industry isheaded in a positive direction. Empty warehousespace is filling up and warehousingindustry insiders are optimistic about continuedgrowth and improved market conditions.“Current vacancy rates are back in thesingle digits and capacities have improvedsubstantially,” Armstrong says.In fact, when we compare the top 203PL warehouse operators of 2010 to 2011,we see that their combined total squarefootage increased 5.6% between 2010 and2011, from 514 million square feet to 543million square feet.While vacancy rates are declining andthe amount of space under managementis on the rise, the industry is not creatingnew warehouse space, Armstrong says.“The warehousing situation is reflective ofwhat’s going on in the general economy,”he says. “We’re passed the downturn andempty space is filling, but there hasn’tbeen significant growth in new facilities.”Looking forward, Armstrong anticipatesstrong single-digit growth for 2012.Biggest to smallestHow then do the 2011 top 3PL warehousesheadquartered in North Americacurrently rank?Like last year, No. 1 DHL Exel SupplyChain tops the list by an immense margin.With hundreds of facilities spread acrossthe country, DHL Exel added 400,000square feet of storage space, bringing itstotal to 95 million square feet.What’s more, DHL Exel is operating58 million square feet more than No. 2ranked Genco ATC, which has a totalof 37 million square feet of warehousespace. Last year, Genco Supply ChainSolutions (as it was known) was rankedNo. 3 with 34.7 million square feet ofwarehouse space. This year, the completionof its acquisition of ATC TechnologyCorp. has helped lift Genco ATC up oneposition.The combination expanded Genco’scapabilities and raised its game. “WhenGenco bought ATC, it got bigger and better,”says Armstrong. “ATC was the mostprofitable value-added warehouse in NorthAmerica. What you have now is a win-winthat put together two Class A operations.”In the No. 3 position, down from2010’s No. 2 spot, is Jacobson Companies.Jacobson and Genco have been tradingpositions on our list for years. This timearound, Jacobson’s total square footageis 35 million square feet, exactly what itreported last year.Rounding out the top five are Americoldand CEVA Logistics. Americold moves uptwo positions from No. 6 to No. 4 with 34.5million square feet, an increase of 27.7%over last year’s 27 million. CEVA is in theNo. 5 position with 33 million square feetof warehouse space.Together, the top five companies have acombined total of 234.5 million square feetof storage space, which is 11.1 million morethan last year’s combined total of 223.4 mil-mmh.com MODERN MATERIALS HANDLING / D E C E M B E R 2 0 1 1 37