The shuttered Master Lock campus on Milwaukee’s northwest side has been sold to a St. Louis-based firm that plans to repurpose the facilities for new users. Commercial Development Co. (CDC) purchased the 26-acre property, located at 2600 N. 32nd St., for $2.6 million, according to state property records. The transaction included machinery and equipment, according
The shuttered Master Lock campus on Milwaukee's northwest side has been sold to a St. Louis-based firm that plans to repurpose the facilities for new users.
Commercial Development Co. (CDC) purchased the 26-acre property, located at 2600 N. 32nd St., for $2.6 million, according to state property records. The transaction included machinery and equipment, according to a statement from CDC.
Master Lock, which manufactured padlocks and other products at the facility, closed the Milwaukee plant last year after 85 years, laying off 330 employees.
The company in January announced it was closing its Oak Creek headquarters as part of a part of a consolidation effort by Deerfield, Illinois-based Fortune Brands Innovations Inc., Master Lock's corporate parent and seller of the 32nd Street site.
The former Master Lock campus in Milwaukee includes 780,000 square feet of industrial space with a mix of single-story and multi-story warehouses.
[caption id="attachment_612136" align="aligncenter" width="869"] The former Master Lock campus. Image from Commercial Development Company[/caption]
CDC says it believes the campus will attract users from multiple sectors including manufacturing, warehousing and industrial storage, thanks to its location and development attributes, including three twenty-ton freight elevators and fully-fenced and secured premises, the statement says.
“Our acquisition of this retired manufacturing plant is the first step to restoring the property to productive use – our team is well equipped to reposition this site for its next stage of life, likely to be industrial operations,” said Adam Kovacs, executive vice president of acquisitions for CDC.
Founded in 1990, CDC is a privately-held real estate acquisition and development firm that specializes in repositioning and redeveloping underutilized, distressed or environmentally-challenged properties, its website says.
In Maryland, the company is planning to bring logistics facilities to a former steel mill, according to its website, and, in Massachusetts, the company is hoping to develop an offshore wind manufacturing hub on the site of a former coal power plant.
However, that's not the case for several CDC-owned properties— including one in Wisconsin.
The company purchased the former 115-acre General Motors assembly plant in Janesville in 2017 and, in 2019, demolished the site's existing buildings. Still undeveloped, the City of Janesville in 2024 initiated a process to condemn the property, saying the property was blighted and that CDC was delinquent in its property taxes, according to city documents. In April, the city made an offer to purchase the property in hopes of finding and supporting development plans.
Nonprofit news organization Inside Climate News reported earlier this year that of the 63 CDC-owned brownfield sites the news organization analyzed, more than three quarters of them have not been redeveloped.
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