Houdini Locks in Big Lease Deal at Buena Park Center
Fullerton-based gift basket maker Houdini Inc. last month signed a 400,000-square-foot lease for an industrial building in Buena Park.
The deal is sure to be one of the top leases of the year in Orange County.
Houdini signed an $11 million, five-year lease at 6311 Knott Ave. in the Knott Distribution Center, according to Trammell Crow Co., which brokered the deal.
Houdini could employ up to 900 workers at the site during its busiest times, sources said.
Houdini, under the name Wine Country Gift Baskets, sells wine and food gift baskets on the Internet and at shops such as Costco, Wal-Mart, Ralphs and Food 4 Less.
The company uses FedEx to ship its gift baskets during the year and “experiences a substantial volume increase during the holiday season,” said FedEx Corp. spokeswoman Allison Sobczak.
The company is expected to use the Buena Park building to assemble and ship gift baskets, according to Michael Foley, senior vice president with Trammell.
Houdini plans to spend more than $2 million to renovate the Buena Park building, according to Foley.
“They will add some office space and create temperature-controlled areas for some products like chocolates,” Foley said.
Foley, Rob Antrobius and Patrick Welsh of Trammell represented building owner ING Clarion in the lease deal.
John Yonai of Pasadena-based Tierra West Real Estate Consultants LLC represented Houdini.
Yonai said Houdini, founded in 1984, previously would lease temporary storage and assembly space during the holidays. Houdini sells most of its baskets during six months of the year, from Christmas to Mother’s Day, he said.
But in the late 1990s, Houdini decided to settle down and signed a 240,000-square-foot lease for space in Fullerton. The company later added an additional 80,000 square feet in the city.
Now the company is expanding in Buena Park where it plans to employ up to 300 workers at any given time, according to Yonai. Since Houdini expects to have three shifts there, it could employ up to 900 workers, he said.
Houdini should move into the Buena Park building in early September, he said.
Houdini employs about 200 workers in Fullerton, with most expected to remain there, Yonai said.
The new lease brings Houdini’s total space to more than 700,000 square feet in the county, he said.
Rob Socci, a broker in the Anaheim office of Voit Commercial Brokerage, worked on Houdini’s first big lease in Fullerton. He said brokers told Houdini at the time that it could always sublease space during slower months.
Activity among big industrial users has picked up in the past few months, which is a big change in the market, Socci said.
Indeed, last month Concord, N.C.-based Cardinal Logistics Management Inc. signed a five-year, $4.4 million lease for a 184,000-square-foot industrial building in Fullerton.
In the past two years or so, most industrial activity here involved small buildings for sale, Socci said.
“Leasing has improved a lot,” Socci said. “Rates are expected to go up as well.”
