Goodyear property sold? Insiders say announcement could be coming soon

There are hints that the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company property is being sold — a potential step toward new industry coming to the plant property, idled since April 2020.

Former Alabama state Rep. Craig Ford, a candidate for mayor of Gadsden, made this post on Facebook Thursday: "Today, I am happy to say, presents new hope for the Goodyear site and for the future it could bring to Gadsden. While I cannot disclose many of the details, I am happy to announce that the plant site has been sold and there is tremendous potential for its development in the near future."

Ford said Friday that he is under a confidentiality agreement and could not identify the purchaser of the property. He said plans are to bring multiple industries to the 2,329,984 square foot, 156-plus acre facility. He said his role in the project was minimal, but he praised the work done to bring new life to the plant and good jobs to Gadsden.

Gadsden's chief industrial recruiter said he couldn't confirm or deny a sale, and a spokesperson for Gadsden Mayor Sherman Guyton indicated the mayor's office was not aware of any sale.

"I am under NDA (a non-disclosure agreement), but can say that the IDA has been working diligently with the national realtor CBRE, since they were engaged by Goodyear as the realtor of record," Gadsden-Etowah Industrial Development Authority Executive Director David Hooks said. "We have made sure the realtor and any of their prospects, some who the IDA provided, had access to any data or people that may expedite the sale of the facility.

"We look forward or CBRE or the company making an announcement soon," he said.

CBRE's website lists the Goodyear property as one of its available industrial properties.

Hooks said the IDA has had "consistent" interest shown in the Goodyear property since the plant closed, with four or five interested buyers touring the plant.

Hooks, and the realtor's website, identify some of the plant's selling points:

• Zoned I-2 (allowing heavy industry)

• Concrete and brick construction

• 2600 V.3 phase power

• 30 loading docks

• Large fenced truck and auto parking lots

• Built in 1929; expanded in 2008

• Access to labor that once served the site

• Access to rail and heavy infrastructure

• Access to Interstate 59 with close proximity to Birmingham and Chattanooga

Hooks said working in industrial recruitment, it is rare to find a single plant requiring the square footage of the Goodyear facility. Instead, such properties are sometimes used to house multiple businesses.

Recent years have seen some large industrial properties in Alabama sold to a national real estate firm, which then seeks tenants for the properties. An affiliate of Milwaukee-based Phoenix Investors purchased the Technicolor Campus in Huntsville in April 2021. The facility on Moores Mill Road spans 1,378,000 square feet on about 161 acres, according to a company press release. In 2017, the company had entered the Huntsville market with the purchase of the Chesebrough-Pond's manufacturing plant, which it "successfully repositioned," the release stated.

In December 2020, an affiliate of Phoenix Investors acquired the former Russell Brands property on Elmore Road in Wetumpka — a 891,000 square foot facility on 102 acres that had been vacant since 2013. In March 2022, Gov. Kay Ivey announced that Los Angeles-based Bella+Canvas, would bring a fabric-cutting industry, and 550 jobs to the Wetumpka plant site. Al.com reported at the time that the industry would use a portion of the former Russell Brands building.

This article originally appeared on The Gadsden Times: Potential sale of Goodyear property could bring multiple industries