Empty building/warehouse. Suggestions?

[Dalgar]

I live in a small, rural town and recently purchased 28,000 square feet of building for a very good price. I'm looking to position the property for an out-of-town business to utilize and create some new jobs in my area. There are no local businesses with a need for this property.

The property is a former middle school in the Midwest, but due to declining enrollment the district closed it down last year. I really believe it would make an amazing fulfillment center for an ecommerce site(s).

I don't run an ecommerce site and am not sure what site owners would be looking for. I'm certainly not going to be able to compete with high-tech fulfillment centers that have been in business for decades. However, I do have a lot of building (that is fully wired with ethernet) that I can use very cheaply. Local labor is very cheap, and very nice state payments are available if $12/hour jobs are created (a great job in my area, and can attract some very good employees).

What is important to ecommerce sites in terms of outsourcing their warehousing and picking/packing/shipping? I'd say a service with the lowest price and lowest errors?

Any generic advice for positioning myself to offer that to someone?

What about additional services on top of the order fulfillment... say inbound/outbound calling, etc?

What do you look for when your ecommerce site becomes larger than a one-person operation?

Thanks.

[jsinger]

former middle school in the Midwest

Middle schools I'm familiar with would seem unsuitable for warehousing. Lots of 1,000 sq foot classrooms with small doors and lots of windows (think theft). Big gym, playground and cafeteria. Showers for 100. Pool? If there's a loading dock, it would likely go into the cafeteria. Often multi-story. How is the zoning?

OTOH, thousands of schools have been converted to other purposes. Those built in the 60s and before were usually very high quality structures. There should be many real estate pros who specialize in school conversions.

[Realbrisk]

Did you ever consider renting per room

[edited by: lorax at 11:40 am (utc) on July 16, 2007]
[edit reason] removed DN [/edit]