Companies create more Chicago warehouse jobs

Posted on June 3, 2016

The opening of a fresh market is creating more Chicago warehouse jobs.

Cermak Fresh Market grocery store in the Avondale neighborhood is bringing fresh food options and 175 full- and part-time jobs to the area.

The project is part of The Fields, a $60 million mixed-use rehabilitation of the iconic Marshall Field’s Warehouse facility on the northwest corner of Diversey Avenue and Pulaski Road. Prior to this redevelopment the facility stood vacant since 2008.

The nearly 70,000-square-foot new grocery store joins Newly Weds Foods and Studio 41 as the first tenants of The Fields complex. At full capacity, companies locating at The Fields are expected to create more than 1,000 new jobs.

When competed the complex will include 100,000-square-feet of retail space, 150,000-square-feet of live/work space, 500,000-square-feet of industrial and warehouse space, 300,000-square feet of office space, plus parking.

Built as a production and distribution plant by the Olson Rug company in the 1920s, the complex was acquired by Marshall Field & Co. in 1965 and subsequently used as a warehouse. Macy’s Inc. acquired the property in its takeover of Field’s in 2005 and the complex closed in 2008.

The City Council approved a Class 8 area certification that will provide expedited approvals on future Class 8 and Class 6(b) tax incentive applications by individual tenants that occupy property at the complex.

In January 2015, City Council approved Class 6(b) property tax incentives for Newly Wed Foods and Studio 41 to rehabilitate two buildings on the site: a 103,000-square-foot building at 4029 West George Street and a 65,000-square-foot building at 4141 West George Street which will allow more room for production space at their other nearby locations.