The odds seemed to be against the players tasked with Building a specialty pharmacy fulfillment center for Catamaran LLC at Jeffersonville’s River Ridge Commerce Center.
By Steve Kaufman, Correspondent Commercial Real Estate Louisville Business First
Mar 14, 2014
Catamaran, a pharmacy-benefit management company, needed a new fulfillment facility completed by the end of the year for its BriovaRx division.
“As I came to understand the requirements better, I recommended building a new facility,” said Lee C. Wilburn, president of Crossdock Development Inc. “And I said I could build it by the end of the year.”
Wilburn had the track record to back up that guarantee.
“In 40 years of business,” Wilburn said, “I’ve never missed a deadline.”
But even Wilburn could not anticipate a dizzying array of complications: the time required to get all the specialized permits needed for a pharmaceutical building; above-average rain in June, July and August that made working outside difficult; and an unexpected shortage of materials including window glass.
Ground was not broken until June 2013, but the building still was completed on time and ready for use on Dec. 23, a Christmas present for Catamaran, River Ridge and the local business development community.
The project was chosen as a finalist in Business First’s 2014 Commercial Real Estate Awards program in the Best Medical Project category for its success in the face of challenges.
The Stats
300: The number of people who worked on the project.
100: Miles of electrical wiring in the building.
200: The expected number of full-time employees that will work at the facility by 2015. Lee C. Wilburn, president of Crossdock Development Inc., said about 60 to 70 employees currently work there.
Communication was key to success
“The need for communications was tremendous,” said Scott Moser, principal of Accurus Engineering LLC, the company which did the front-end development work on the site. “We held weekly meetings throughout the life of the project to head off issues and do any course corrections.”
There was nothing they could do about the rain, he said, except “to dance around it.”
But he was proactive when other delays threatened completion.
For example, when the special window glass they wanted was found to be out of stock, Wilburn located a medical facility being built in Lexington that was using the same glass.
“They were behind schedule anyway, so I traded with them,” he said.