Furnishings storage corporations now prioritize e-commerce

All are within the Marginals and strategically located, in order to be transformed into storage sheds aimed at quick deliveries.

The lack of warehouses close to the consumer’s home to speed up e-commerce deliveries is changing the landscape of the city of São Paulo and opening new fronts for storage companies. GoodStorage, for example, which started in 2013 as a furniture store, today positions itself as an urban logistics company, offering storage for individuals and companies.

An example of this transformation was the purchase of Alstom’s train factory, in Lapa, in the west of the city. With the industry moving to Taubaté (SP), a plot of 80 thousand square meters was vacant, with 65 thousand m² of sheds.

“We are renovating these warehouses, which will create a logistics park in the heart of Lapa”, says Thiago Cordeiro, CEO of GoodStorage. The enterprise starts operating in February and already has a pre-leased part.

The Alstom factory was acquired before the pandemic, as well as other properties, many of them occupied by industries.

All are within the Marginals and strategically located, in order to be transformed into storage sheds aimed at quick deliveries.

Today the company has seven urban logistics parks, which total an area of ​​150 thousand m² and investments of US$ 150 million. Four are already in operation, with 90% occupancy.

In five years, the plan is to have 500,000 m² of logistics warehouses in the city of São Paulo, with additional investments of US$ 250 million. “Despite the high interest rate not being favorable to real estate investment, we will continue to invest a lot, because there is a lack of infrastructure.”

Pandemic

Another company that changed its positioning was Unlog. It started two years ago as a parking space rental platform, but it didn’t work out.

Michele D’Ippolito, managing partner of the company, says that the solution was to turn the company towards urban logistics, in which rent is more valued. Small sheds were then opened, with sizes ranging between 200 and 1,000 m², which are spread across neighborhoods within large cities.

“We aimed at a little ant and hit an elephant”, says D’Ippolito. With the change, he immediately managed to win over clients such as Ambev, Mercado Livre, Americanas and other giants.

The businessman explains that “granularization” of storage within large centers is the new trend. As a result, the most varied spaces began to be used: from deactivated stores to warehouses and also part of idle parking lots. “We are very eclectic, and our model is very hybrid.”

On Rua 25 de Março, a popular shopping center in the center of the capital, the company occupies part of a parking lot. The leased area was transformed into a container storage point and is also used for the transshipment and removal of items.

In Vila Olímpia, south of the city, the company has a storage area of ​​400 m², divided into small logistics hubs. They are rented by online retailers, such as Amaro, Riachuelo and companies such as Infracommerce, focused on the implementation of e-commerce for industries.

In fact, consumer goods industries, such as Philip Morris and Canon, which are in this unit, are the company’s main customers.

Pre-salt

“For us, the pandemic was magical”, says the businessman, who in the midst of the covid-19 health crisis saw his business take a leap. “In 2021, we grew revenues by 1,600%.”

The business was so successful that a specific division of warehouses, Undock, was created. Today there are 28 units that add up to about 20 thousand m² of storage area in more than 20 cities.

The goal is to have 700 storage hubs in six years. And the next frontier to be explored will be the “pre-salt”, jokes the businessman.

It refers to the underground areas of big cities that are idle and need a lot of technology to be explored. “This is the next step that we see as the square meter with great potential to be re-signified for logistics.”

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