Although industrial and logistics remains real estate’s strongest-performing sector, it is still one of the laggards when it comes to diversity. Mirastar’s chief executive Ekaterina Avdonina, chief investment officer Anthony Butler and KKR’s head of acquisitions for European real estate Seb d’Avanzo offered plenty of food for thought on the matter (more of that in our latest Retail, Leisure and Logistics special, out this week).
Talk turned to musings on why some might find a job in logistics real estate off-putting – and, as it turns out, if there is one thing underpinning property’s fastest growing sector, it’s the fast food. “I think it’s a lack of appropriate eateries and lunch places on site visits,” Avdonina theorised. “The amount of McDonald’s that are consumed out of town, on site inspections, can be very off-putting for someone with a vegan diet, I can tell you that.”
D’Avanzo agreed: “It’s the lorry drivers’ burger van, you know, when you pull into an industrial estate. It’s not the most salubrious.” The omnipresence of fried onions was also profoundly criticised. Diary secretly loves a chicken nugget, though, and wonders if it’s not too late to start thinking about a career in logistics…
Flower power
Real estate can be blooming brilliant sometimes, and JLL’s green-fingered head of UK valuation and alternatives Ollie Saunders definitely agrees. Saunders has set up Chiswick Flower Market with a group of fellow residents – the first new flower market in London in 150 years – in a bid to create a “Columbia Road of the west”.
Starting from 6 September, the open-air market will run from 9.30am on Chiswick High Road, W4, on the first Sunday of each month until December as part of a trial run. After this, the group hopes it will become a more permanent fixture – a hardy perennial, if you will.
The petal power initiative aims to revitalise the town centre, get more people into horticulture, support independent businesses and promote the sustainability agenda, including setting up a local cargo bike delivery scheme. The market will also feature a business zone, comprising five stalls for enterprises set up by young people during the pandemic.
As Saunders tells Diary: “You can never have enough plants in your life.”
We’ll be rooting for him!
The Prime directive
We don’t know about anybody else, but Amazon has been pretty much a daily visitor to the Diary household these past few months. After all, one of the few upsides of the pandemic is that it has been pretty much impossible to miss a parcel delivery. Will our endless list of essential purchases and impulse buys (probably more of the latter than the former, to be honest) soon be arriving without the human touch?
It seems so, with the news that Amazon has been given the green light to use drones to deliver packages in the US. Prime Air will take to the skies for testing, now the Federal Aviation Administration has given its approval (officials, presumably, like everyone, just want their stuff and they want it right now).
Surely it’s only a matter of time before the UK gets the same treatment, at which point Diary, for one, will welcome its new airborne overlords. If all this goes on much longer, we’ll need a dedicated drone bouncing back-and-forth between us and the warehouse.
In living Colorama
Diary’s first ever Saturday job was as a hopelessly underqualified sales assistant in a camera shop. We have fond memories of taking in customers’ photographic film and a day or two later handing over their developed holiday snaps (younger readers might want to Google this process). So we, more than most, have our interest caught by news of a residential development on the site of the former Colorama Processing Laboratories on the corner of Webber Street and Rushworth Road in Borough, SE1.
The company, founded by Naresh Patel, revolutionised the photo printing industry by offering a 48-hour turnaround. And, fittingly, the seven-storey Colorama building promises picture perfect apartments in the ideal setting, designed by Alan Camp Architects in a style replicating an elegant Victorian warehouse. The design allows all tenants to benefit from views across the capital including the London Eye, the Shard and Canary Wharf – ideal for residents with a good eye and a zoom lens.
We’re sure the 24 apartments will be snapped up fast, although 48 hours might be pushing it.
