Nature’s Best, a distributor of vitamins, supplements and health foods, has settled plans to move its warehouse to Chino and leave about 350,000 square feet of industrial space in Brea.
The company has signed a $25 million, 10-year deal for a 409,588-square-foot warehouse at the Watson Commerce Center in Chino.
Nature’s Best, which has yearly sales of $300 million and has been in Orange County for more than 20 years, plans to keep a small office in Brea for its headquarters, according to Chief Executive Jim Beck.
The company has said for some time it had outgrown its Brea distribution center and was hunting for more space.
Nature’s Best has grown in recent years as natural food products have become mainstream offerings for most grocery stores.
“It will be a great thing for the company,” Beck said of the move to Chino. “We are growing like crazy and we need the space to keep up with it.”
Nature’s Best plans to gradually shift operations in Chino and phase out its Brea buildings by summer of 2008, Beck said.
The company’s lease in Brea with Newport Beach-based Alere Property Group LLC ends in 2008.
The Chino site is set to become Nature’s Best’s distribution center for California, according to Beck.
Most of the company’s 400 workers,including drivers, stockers and buyers,are set to move to Chino.
Many already commute to OC, according to Beck. A handful come from as far away as Victorville and Palos Verdes, he said.
“We are hoping not to lose them,we are hoping they will all move with us,” Beck said. “We worked hard to find a facility that was close enough to our employee base.”
In 1990, when Nature’s Best moved to Brea from Torrance, it “didn’t lose a single employee,” Beck said.
Nature’s Best, which got a 2006 Family Owned Business award from the Business Journal, didn’t have much luck finding bigger space in OC, according to Beck.
The company spent more than a year looking, he said.
The search spanned OC, Los Angeles County and as far as Moreno Valley and Redlands, Beck said.
“Rates in L.A. and OC are quite steep,” he said. “The best financial options were far east of here.”
Jeff Chiate, Rick Ellison and Chuck Belden from Cushman & Wakefield Inc. represented Nature’s Best in the Chino lease.
Tom Taylor and Steve Belletti of Colliers International represented Watson Land Co., which is developing 60 acres into a master-planned industrial park in Chino.
Nature’s Best plans to have the Chino site outfitted with offices, warehouses and about 70 docks for loading delivery trucks, Beck said.
The outskirts of OC and the Inland Empire have become just about the only choices for companies looking for large industrial buildings.
The vacancy rate for industrial buildings here is less than 3%, ac-cording to Chiate.
That puts Na-ture’s Best’s Brea buildings into play in a tight market.
“We’ve already got multiple interested parties,” Chiate said, declining to elaborate.
Landlord Alere is looking to land a five- to 10-year lease for the space, according to Chiate.
Nature’s Best is taking a worn path out of OC.
Huntington Beach-based surfwear maker Quiksilver Inc. said a year ago it was moving some distribution outside OC after leasing a 683,000-square-foot warehouse in Mira Loma.
Sole Technology Inc., a Lake Forest-based shoe and clothing maker, last year bought a 315,000-square-foot warehouse and distribution building in Fontana.
And American Sporting Goods Corp., an Aliso Viejo-based maker of basketball shoes, is moving its warehouse operations to Fontana.
Nature’s Best distributes a variety of products, from organic foods, nutritional supplements and herbs to personal care items and frozen foods.
The company delivers to health and natural food stores, supermarkets, restaurants, colleges, schools and drug stores in the Western U.S., Hawaii, Alaska and as far away as Hong Kong and the Philippines.
Nature’s Best has deals with about 1,200 suppliers and brings in a hundred new products each week, Beck said.
Big customers include Costa Me-sa-based Mother’s Market, Thousand Oaks-based Las-sen’s Natural Foods & Vitamins, San Luis Obispo-based New Front-iers Natural Foods, Phoenix-based Sprouts Farmers Markets and Down to Earth Natural Foods in Hawaii.
