Occupier Service
Site Selection.
Operations-led search across Metro Vancouver.
Got a site selection question? Talk to Samuel directly. No gatekeepers, no forms required.
Overview
What Site Selection covers
Site selection for industrial occupiers is an operations problem before it is a real estate problem. The right site lowers your operating cost for the length of the lease. The wrong one adds cost every day you are in it. Effective site selection starts with how your business actually moves goods, hires labour, and serves customers, and then finds the real estate that fits those variables.
The Process
How the process works
01.
Operations Profile Workshop
Document throughput, peak vs. average flows, labour requirements, customer geography, vehicle routing, and capital envelope.
02.
Submarket Modeling
Evaluate Metro Vancouver submarkets against your operations profile. Identify the 2 to 4 submarkets that genuinely fit before consuming time on site tours.
03.
Building Specification Translation
Translate operations requirements into building specifications - clear height, loading, column spacing, power, floor flatness, yard depth - for use in site sourcing.
04.
Site Sourcing & Tour Coordination
On-market and off-market sourcing within the target submarkets. Structured tour coordination with consistent evaluation criteria.
05.
Comparative Site Analysis
Side-by-side modeling of operational economics across shortlisted sites - transportation cost, labour cost, capex requirements, lease economics, growth optionality.
06.
Recommendation & Execution
Documented site recommendation with operational and economic rationale. Transition to lease or acquisition negotiation.
Who This Is For
Who this service is for
- Operators expanding into Metro Vancouver from other markets
- Existing tenants relocating with materially different operational requirements
- Companies evaluating multi-site networks (consolidation or expansion)
- Manufacturers evaluating production capacity expansion
- 3PL operators selecting facilities for new client engagements
What You Get
What you receive
- Operations profile documentation
- Submarket analysis with operational fit scoring
- Building specification requirements documentation
- On-market and off-market site sourcing
- Comparative site analysis with full operational economics
- Documented recommendation and rationale
- Transition to lease or acquisition execution
When to Engage
When to engage
Engage 9 to 18 months ahead of required occupancy for complex site selection mandates. Multi-site network decisions, manufacturing site selection, and large-format requirements (100,000+ SF) routinely take 6 to 12 months from kickoff through to lease or acquisition. Build-out timelines add additional months for specialty installations.
Why Me
Why work with me
I focus exclusively on industrial and work the Metro Vancouver submarkets day to day. The right answer for a 50,000 SF cold storage operator is not the same as the right answer for a 50,000 SF manufacturing tenant, so I start with how your business moves goods, hires labour, and serves customers, and then match buildings to that. I stay directly involved from the first workshop through lease or acquisition negotiation.
Frequently Asked Questions
Site Selection, answered.
How do I evaluate submarkets for an industrial site selection?
Submarket evaluation should rank against your specific operational profile - labour catchment for your wage range and skill requirements, transportation cost to your customer geography, real estate cost, growth optionality, and brand fit. Generic submarket rankings rarely fit specific tenants. The right framework scores submarkets against your operations, not against generic criteria.
How important is labour catchment in site selection?
Labour catchment is frequently the highest-leverage variable in industrial site selection. Your ability to recruit and retain labour shapes your operational economics for the duration of the hold. Submarkets with weak labour catchment frequently look attractive on real estate economics but deliver materially worse operational economics over time. Modeling labour cost and availability is essential.
What's the right balance between rent and operations cost?
Real estate cost typically represents 5 to 15 percent of total operations cost. Optimizing real estate at the expense of labour, transportation, or operational efficiency typically delivers worse total economics. The right framework models total operations cost over the hold period, with rent as one input. The lowest rent is rarely the right answer.
Should we consider multiple submarkets or commit early?
Early commitment to a submarket without operational analysis is one of the most common site selection mistakes. The right approach is structured submarket evaluation upfront, identifying the 2 to 4 submarkets that genuinely fit your operations, and tour-time only within those. This produces better decisions and avoids the bias toward submarkets the team is already familiar with.