Goodman Buys Anheuser-Busch Brewery Site in Newark

Goodman North America Management LLC has bought Anheuser-Busch’s brewery plant in Newark, N.J., for $360 million, a deal that gives the Australian industrial real estate company control of one of the largest redevelopment sites in the New York metropolitan area and signals another step in the brewer’s long-running effort to reshape its U.S. manufacturing network.

The transaction closed in April, according to CoStar, after Anheuser-Busch announced late last year that it planned to sell the property. Goodman’s North American office is in Irvine, Calif. The company said it intends to turn the 1.7 million-square-foot site into a high-end industrial manufacturing, distribution and logistics complex.

The property sits at 200 US-1 in Newark, near Newark Liberty International Airport and Port Newark, on 83.6 acres that Goodman has described as a strategically located logistics site. CoStar said Goodman paid about $43.6 million for the buildings and $317 million for the land. The company did not respond to requests for comment on its plans for the site.

Newmark Group represented Anheuser-Busch in the sale. The buyer’s brokers were not identified. In a statement released by Newmark, Adam Donegar, an executive vice chairman at the firm and one of Anheuser-Busch’s advisers on the deal, said few properties offered that level of scale, connectivity and zoning flexibility, adding that the location could support future industrial and infrastructure users.

CoStar property records show Anheuser-Busch remains a tenant at the site. The brewery plant was built in 1951 and is classified as a Class C facility.

The sale comes as Anheuser-Busch, based in St. Louis and known for brands including Budweiser, Bud Light and Michelob Ultra, continues to consolidate operations across its U.S. network. The company has said it has invested nearly $2 billion to modernize about 100 manufacturing plants nationwide as it responds to changing consumer demand and broader economic pressure. When it announced plans to sell the Newark brewery in December, it also said it would close plants in Fairfield, Calif., and Merrimack, N.H.

For Goodman, the purchase adds a major asset to a portfolio that includes more than 445 properties worldwide valued at about $58.3 billion across five continents, according to company figures from May. The firm has also begun work on a 140,000-square-foot data center in Vernon, Calif.

CoStar said Goodman paid about $212 a square foot for the Newark property, above the West Newark submarket’s 12-month average of $145 a square foot for industrial properties.