Corning Inc., a major materials science company, announced last week it is halting its operations at its distribution facility in Edgecombe County, according to the Triangle Business Journal.

Corning is handing off management of the 780K SF site in the Kingsboro Business Park, located off Highway 64 between Rocky Mount and Tarboro, to Florida-based transportation and logistics company Ryder, the company told TBJ.

In a document it filed with the state of North Carolina, Corning cited a strategic shift in business operations as its reason for leaving Edgecombe County.

Ryder will reportedly distribute products for Corning at the center, the company’s North America life sciences hub. The hub was built specifically for Corning’s operations, comprising 750K SF of warehouse space and 30K SF for offices.

With this move, Corning will lay off more than 120 workers, but they will be offered the chance to join Ryder.

Corning will maintain the lease for the facility, a spokesperson for the company said. Ryder will be responsible for all daily operations starting April 19.

In 2017, when Corning selected North Carolina for a two-county manufacturing expansion, the company committed an $86M investment in Edgecombe County. 

Corning will maintain its strong presence in other parts of the state, including a large facility with more than 1M SF of space in Wilmington at 310 N. College Road, as well as plants in Newton, Concord and Winston-Salem

In January, the company announced a $6B supply agreement with Meta to provide fiber-optic cable for data center development, which would require expanding its manufacturing facility in Hickory, north of Charlotte in Catawba County. When this project is complete, Corning will reportedly have the largest fiber-optic cable plant in the world.

Last year, Corning reported net sales of $15.6B, up 19% from the previous year.

Courtesy of Merriman Schmitt Architects

Construction is well underway on the final undeveloped site in the Pineville industrial corridor in the Charlotte metro area.

The last large-scale development there, the Pineville Distribution Center, will be a 194K SF Class-A industrial facility some 15 miles south of Charlotte, according to a Jan. 26 press release from Iconic Equities.

Iconic Equities, a Miami-based industrial real estate investment firm, led rezoning efforts for the center last year along with Shoreline Capital. Along with Iconic Overlook Ventures and LaSalle Investment Management, Iconic Equities is developing the project. 

Iconic Equities CEO Tim Bishop declined to provide details on the price tag for the development.

The 15-acre site is at 10203 Pineville Distribution St. on 15 acres in Mecklenburg County, with good access to I-485 and I-77.

The new facility will reportedly be used as a build-to-suit warehouse for distribution. Construction began in November and is expected to be completed later this year.

“Being the last available site adds scarcity value,” Bishop said in an email. “And the location is already proven, with major tenants in the nearby Carolina Logistics Park.”

The 288-acre Carolina Logistics Park features a 525K SF distribution center for Campbell Snacks and a 526K SF Amazon facility.

Beacon Properties developed the nearby logistics park, which has more than 3M SF of industrial space, and last year sold much of it amid deals totaling some $500M. 

“The Charlotte market is experiencing exceptional demand for high-quality industrial properties, fueled by population growth, e-commerce expansion, and regional manufacturing strength,” Bishop said. 

Industrial vacancy in the Charlotte metro area dropped at the end of last year to 7.5%, according to CBRE, backed by 2.3M SF of net absorption. For the year, tenants took 9.5M SF more than they vacated in the metro area.  

CBRE’s outlook for 2026 predicts a 5% year-over-year increase in national industrial leasing activity to nearly 1B SF. 

Black Salmon acquired the Camp Creek Commerce Center, a newly constructed 220,000 square foot distribution facility located at 5001 North Commerce Drive in East Point, Georgia. The price for the center was $41 million. Crow Holdings was the seller.

The company inked a $30.1 million acquisition loan, a floating-rate, five-year loan through Prime Finance as part of the deal.

The Class-A distribution center was completed in 2024 and features 32-foot clear heights, 310-foot building depth and concrete tilt-wall construction optimized for logistics operations.

The property is currently 68% occupied by Grady Health System. Grady operates a 46,894-square-foot pharmaceutical facility within the space.

Located just 0.6 miles from Interstate 285 and 2.0 miles from Interstate 85, the property offers direct connectivity to Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport within 4.5 miles.

The JLL Capital Markets, which arranged the financing, was led by Melissa Rose, Bobby Norwood, Connor McCarthy and Streeter Simmons.

Don’t Miss Carter Andrus, Chief Operating Officer of Prologis, as the keynote interview at Connect Industrial Midwest.— taking place Tuesday afternoon, March 10, 2026, at Joe’s Live in Rosemont, IL.

The York County Council in South Carolina voted Tuesday to approve a tax incentive deal to bring a Costco distribution center to Rock Hill near Charlotte, according to The Herald.

During the third and final reading of the ordinance and after hours of contentious debate, the vote passed.

However, the council used a legislative maneuver to find the money for the tax deal that some found dubious at best, leaving open the question of whether Costco will accept the deal in the end. 

The vote continues the saga for a development deal with Costco that was once so secretive that it was given the codename “Project Sample,” the Charlotte Business Journal reported.

Costco had imposed a deadline of Dec. 11 for the county to approve the incentive plans. 

The distribution site, slated to open in 2027 at Interstate 77 and Porter Road, would span 168 acres and service 20 Costco regional warehouse stores in the Carolinas and Georgia. The project is expected to result in 165 jobs. 

Construction would be done in two phases. The first phase would be the construction of a 541K SF distribution center. Once operational, the building would then be expanded to nearly 900K SF, the Charlotte Business Journal reported.

Panattoni Development Co. is expected to develop the site.

The York County Council debated various incentive packages to entice Costco to build its warehouse before landing on a $25M credit to offset a little more than half of the reported $44M the company would pay for public infrastructure improvements. 

According to county documents, Costco sought a $30M credit to offset these costs, the CBJ reported.

While debating how to pay for the incentive, however, the council came up with a formula that would require the city of Rock Hill and the Rock Hill School District to give back millions to the county in tax credits. The argument in favor of this is that both entities would receive more tax revenue than they lost when the distribution center is built. 

At the last minute, however, a divided council shifted more of the tax credit clawback burden to the city and away from the school district.

The deal, which the county has been discussing for months, sparked backlash and confusion.

Home Depot has been renting a 1.4 million-square-foot distribution center in Savannah for 30 years. It has now bought the building and an adjacent 100 acres of raw land. Home Depot paid $145.5 million to acquire the distribution center, which spans about 325 acres near the Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport.

The seller was the Savannah Economic Development Authority, which developed the broader business park that includes companies such as Gulfstream Aerospace Corp. 

The Atlanta Business Chronicle reports that Home Depot has leased much of the space for its supply chain operations. According to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, at the end of 2023, the company owned just 3% of its more than 100 million square feet of warehouses and distribution centers. In contrast, it owned 80% of its stores at that time. 

Colliers has closed the sale of a two-building distribution portfolio totaling 245,000 square feet in the Southwest submarket of Indianapolis, Indiana.

Comprised of 4316 W Minnesota Street and 4750 Kentucky Avenue, the fully occupied infill properties are home to a wholesale industrial packaging company, BASCO, and logistics and warehousing providers, Golden Tiger Transportation and Kid Glove Service. Both highly functional facilities provide immediate interstate access and efficient connection to the Indianapolis International Airport (IND), FedEx Airhub, and downtown Indianapolis.

The Colliers Industrial Capital Markets – Midwest Team, led by Alex Cantu and Alex Davenport, facilitated the transaction on behalf of Clarion Partners, a leading real estate investment manager with a presence in major markets across the United States and Europe. The assets were purchased by Diamond Properties, a New York-based commercial real estate investment firm managing a diverse portfolio of more than 16 million square feet.

An Amazon delivery station will locate in Tyler. The Tyler Economic Development Council completed the sale of 30 acres to Amazon for the construction of a new delivery station.

The new 140,000-square-foot facility will be located at the Tyler Interstate Commerce Park on CR 334 (Center Church Road), with construction beginning in the coming weeks. The new delivery station will help power the last mile of Amazon’s fulfillment process. Amazon has invested $70 billion in Texas since 2010.

Other significant economic investments being made in Tyler include:

BraunAbility, which creates automobile mobility products for people with disabilities, is partnering with SunCap Property Group to construct a 140,000-square-foot building on 29 acres at the park.

The Tyler City Council recently approved an economic development plan in partnership with Bass Pro Shops. Bass Pro Outdoor World will receive a sales tax rebate, contingent on meeting specific performance criteria.

Fresh-food distributor, Foster, has purchased a distribution warehouse in Winston-Salem. Food company Purple Crow sold the 157,878 square foot building at 2900 Lowery St. for $23.5 million. Purple Crow is a distributor of Hispanic foods that announced new headquarters last year at Whitaker Park, the former Reynolds Tobacco complex.

The Triad Business Journal reports Foster plans to lease the property for a new headquarters and logistics center to serve customers in retail, business-to-business and wholesale trade, as well as restaurants and business and industry food service. Foster currently operates from the Piedmont Triad Farmers Market in Colfax.

With incentives from Winston-Salem and Forsyth County worth up to $86,550, the company announced an investment of about $6.25 million over five years and an expected 165 additional jobs.

On its website Foster says the company began as Foster & Caviness, a small fruit and vegetable business in Greensboro, North Carolina, that is now a multi-state and multi-disciplined provider of food supply chain solutions.

INDUS Realty Trust picked up a newly delivered 550,000-square-foot industrial facility that houses Dublin-based Primark’s distribution center. The property is fully leased to Primark, one of the largest clothing retailers in Europe. VanTrust Real Estate sold the recently completed project, Building 200 at 1511 Zoo Parkway in Jacksonville.

The Conlan Co. obtained a permit to make tenant improvements to the Imeson Park South building for Primark at a project cost of $14.5 million. In June 2022, the city issued a permit for The Conlan Co. to build the speculative building at a cost of $25.9 million.

The Primark distribution center has 40-foot clear heights, 99 dock-high doors, four drive-in doors and 175 trailer parking stalls. Primark began operations at the warehouse earlier this year, and the facility is the retailer’s second distribution center in the U.S.

JLL represented VanTrust. John Huguenard, Luis Castillo, Cody Brais, and Taylor Osborne led the JLL Capital Markets Investment Sales and Advisory team.

VanTrust Real Estate, LLC is set to begin construction on a build-to-suit facility for Sephora.

The 746,672-square-foot structure will be located on 61 acres at Avon Landings Commerce Park in Avon, Indiana, and will serve as Sephora’s Midwest distribution center. The targeted completion date is the summer of 2025. This is VanTrust’s second project with Sephora, with the first facility completed in Las Vegas.

CBRE’s Toby Mink and Andrew Morris represented Sephora. The general contractor for the project is Pepper Construction, MacGregor Architects is the architect, and American Structurepoint as the civil engineer.

“Avon Landings is a 119-acre master-planned park with a prime location, near Indianapolis, a dynamic market we continue to invest in,” said Phil Rasey, vice president of development at VanTrust. “We are pleased that Sephora, one of the best-known retail brands in the world, has chosen to locate its distribution center here.”