Aluminum Shapes building eyed for redevelopment

Aluminum Shapes, a sizable aluminum extrusion plant in Pennsauken, New Jersey, remains idled after its previous owner declared bankruptcy last year. The building’s new owner says aluminum production may yet return to the site, although a future as a distribution warehouse is another potential outcome.

A Feb. 6 article by the Philadelphia Inquirer goes into considerable detail on the recent history of Aluminum Shapes, including its role in a Department of Justice investigation of a Chinese company’s prosecuted attempts to avoid tariffs.

The currently empty plant in southern New Jersey made extrusions and melted aluminum scrap from the 1950s until earlier this decade. It closed last August, says the newspaper, when the company “filed for bankruptcy protection in Camden [New Jersey], owing millions to suppliers and others,” according to the Inquirer.

The article’s author, Bob Fernandez, says scrap companies were among those jilted suppliers, citing one New Jersey scrap firm that says it is owed more than $170,000.

The bankruptcy filing occurred around the same time the most recent owner of Aluminum Shapes, Liu Zhongtian of Liaoyang, China- based China Zhongwang, was convicted on counts related to avoiding tariffs on aluminum imports. Liu is scheduled to be sentenced in the case (in abstentia) on Feb. 28.

A co-founder of the commercial real estate developer that now owns the 600,000-square-foot Aluminum Shapes building (which sits on a 25-acre parcel) is quoted as saying the aluminum production equipment remains in place within the building.

The firm, Velocity Venture Partners, says it has had previous success leasing to companies seeking distribution warehouse space, and it is selling off some of the equipment inside the Aluminum Shapes building.

However, Tony Grelli, the Velocity co-founder, says more than half the building could remain dedicated to metals production, with the furnaces and presses staying in place and being leased to a new tenant.

The full article can be viewed on this web page.