Connecticut’s hot industrial real estate market — spurred by demand for last-mile warehouse space from e-commerce giants like Amazon — has been a boon to the state’s economy, kick-starting job creation and new construction across the region.
And few have capitalized on the growing industry like David Winstanley and his sons, Adam and Carter, who are owners of the family-run realty shop, Winstanley Enterprises LLC.
Case in point: In January Winstanley announced plans to develop an 819,000-square-foot distribution center in Enfield as the final stage of a redevelopment of the former Hallmark property.
Hallmark announced plans to close its 1 million-square-foot distribution center in 2015, trimming more than 500 jobs in the process.
Winstanely paid $12 million for the 324-acre property the following year, announcing plans for redevelopment that would return jobs to Enfield.
The company reports spending more than $41 million to renovate two Hallmark buildings on the Bacon Road site. That brought three new tenant companies in 2018.
Winstanley also carved off a 200-acre parcel – 35 Bacon Road – for redevelopment. That space is the focus of this final redevelopment push for the Hallmark property.
Winstanley Enterprises is based in Massachusetts, but is Connecticut’s largest owner of warehouses and has offices in Hartford, New Haven and Bristol. It solidified its local prowess in 2020 by buying J.C. Penney’s former Manchester distribution center and spending $44 million on a pair of abutting food distribution and storage facilities in South Windsor, which were later sold off.
In 2021 Winstanley announced that it sold a portfolio of 11 Stop & Shop-anchored properties, including three in the Nutmeg State, for $295 million. It also landed Amazon as the anchor tenant at the former Nabisco warehouse property in Glastonbury, which Winstanley purchased in September 2020 for $4.4 million.
Meanwhile, Winstanley also kicked off construction on a $100 million bioscience tower in New Haven that will add another 500,000 square feet of laboratory and life-sciences incubation space in the Elm City.