Four new tenants move into SBIP
Journal of Business
By David Cole
Growing metal fabricator relocates from East Trent; park gets three other tenants
SPOKANE, WA- Hydrafab Northwest Inc., a growing Spokane-based metal fabricating company, has leased a 16,000-square-foot space in the Spokane Business & Industrial Park and has moved there from a 9,000-square-foot leased facility at 4809 E. Trent.
Hydrafab is one of four companies, the other three all based out of state, that have leased space in the industrial park this month, says Dean Stuart, the park’s director of marketing. The other new tenants there are Gale Contractor Services, a subsidiary of Taylor, Mich.-based Masco Corp.; Noodle Head Inc., of Santa Barbara, Calif.; and Otis Spunkmeyer Inc., of San Leandro Calif.
Hydrafab leased space in the park’s building No. 15 and moved from “cramped” quarters on Trent Avenue to improve the company’s efficiency, says Hydrafab owner and President Chris Henjum. The company currently employs nine people, he says.
“We’ve seen a consistent pattern of sales growth,” Henjum says. Hydrafab’s former space on Trent Avenue was divided into four work areas, and the new space allows the company to operate with all its equipment in one room, he says.
The company’s primary areas of business growth have been in specialty piping, tube and pipe bending, and sheet metal fabrication. It primarily has been making prototypes and doing short production runs, he says, adding, “We’re doing a lot of custom projects right now.”
The company also does specialty welding and finishing using metals such as aluminum, stainless steel, titanium, zirconium and mild steel.
Separately, Gale Contractor Services, which furnishes and installs insulation and garage doors, in leasing about 20,000 square feet of space at the industrial park, also in building No. 15, and has moved there from a 30,000-square-foot space at 5414 E. Broadway.
Noodle Head, which develops, sells, and distributes toys, has leased about 7,200 square feet of space in building No. 2, which it will use as a shipping warehouse and sales and administration office, says Chris Ryan, vice president.
The company no longer will be using two shipping warehouses, one in Denver and the other in north Spokane at 1620 E. Houston, Ryan says.
It also will no longer use its 750-square-foot sales office in Spokane Valley, at 408 N. Mullan Road.
Otis Spunkmeyer, which makes frozen cookie dough, ready-baked muffins, and a variety of other bakery products and distributes them to food service and retail outlets, has leased about 4,000 square feet of space in building No. 25 and plans to use the space as a sales and distribution outlet, Stuart says.