4imprint completes 170,000-square-foot expansion

Heather Graves

Staff

November 18, 2024

OSHKOSH – Support continued growth, enhance employee amenities, increase solar capabilities, create opportunities for the workforce – these, John Lord, senior vice president of operations, said, were the main goals of the recent expansion project at 4imprint^®’s Oshkosh Distribution Center.

“The distribution center expansion equips us to support our future growth while enhancing both our customer and associate experience,” 4imprint CEO Kevin Lyons-Tarr said.

The 170,000-square-foot expansion, Lord said, is promotional products retailer 4imprint’s most recent expansion.

“Being a part of the initial growth from when we first broke ground on our initial distribution center in 2009, to the addition we did in 2015, to another addition in 2019 and then this addition – seeing the progression of the company’s growth and being able to hire many people along the way I think has been my favorite part,” he said.

The 475,000-square-foot distribution center located at 2875 Atlas Ave. in Oshkosh, Lord said, houses more than half of 4imprint’s 1,600 team members.

4imprint is part of 4imprint Group, plc – a publicly traded company on the London Stock Exchange.

The company provides promotional products to millions of customers throughout the United States, Canada, United Kingdom and Ireland – offering corporate gifts, personalized gifts, custom T-shirts, promotional pens, travel mugs, tote bags, water bottles, adhesive notes, custom calendars and embroidered polos.

A long time coming

Though construction on the expansion started in November 2023, Lord said the process of getting to that point started 12-18 months prior to that.

“We were seeing that our distribution center was reaching capacity and kind of projected out the future,” he said. “We started playing through scenarios – ‘Could we do this expansion on this site? How would it fit? How would it potentially flow? Do we have enough space?’”

The project, Lord said, “was right on time” – thanks in part to 2023’s mild winter.

“We got a lot of things done in January that you wouldn’t normally have (with) the way the weather was,” he said. “The wind in the spring kind of made it a little bit of a challenge, but they stayed on schedule the whole time and completed in August.”

Lord said 4imprint had “great partners” work through the construction process alongside them – specifically Excel Engineering and C.D. Smith out of Fond du Lac.

“They took our recommendations and stepped it up and brought it to a whole new level,” he said. “We’re very appreciative of having people like that in the Fox Valley area that we can turn to.”

Working on a four-shift process – “first, second, third and weekend shift, which we call fourth shift” – the distribution center expansion, Lord said, helps with recruitment efforts.

“It gives us the extra room that we can recruit and retain people on those shifts,” he said. “Sometimes it’s easier to find the people on the first shift than some of the other shifts, so having the additional space allows us to accommodate that increased capacity.”

Light it up

In addition to increased production capacity, Lord said the expansion reinforces the company’s commitment to the local community and sustainability.  

This, he said, included the addition of 1,488 new solar panels to the distribution center’s existing array installed in 2022 – bringing the total to more than 4,000.

Lord said the additional panels increase the array’s solar capacity by 56% – which is proportional to the facility’s growth.

“We added approximately a similar proportionate amount to our solar arrays to cover the energy consumption in that area,” he said. “We weren’t over building the array – rather building just enough to offset the energy usage.”

Lord said the additional panels were part of the plan from the beginning.

Employee amenities

With one of the goals of the expansion being enhanced employee amenities, Lord said a variety of additions were included in the project.

One such feature, he said, is an on-site comprehensive health clinic with a waiting area, exam rooms, physical therapy space and lab.

The enhanced and expanded clinic will provide team members with convenient access to on-site healthcare services, often at no additional cost, promoting overall well-being. 

“We’ve been working with ThedaCare over the years, and we’ve had an on-site clinic, but it was usually like a conference room that was taken over and they provided some direct exams, flu shots, basic health care sort of thing,” he said.

Lord said the expansion provided 4imprint with an opportunity to expand the clinic and make it available for employees’ dependents as well.

“We wanted to have a bigger clinic that not only our associates could use, but their dependents as well,” he said. “So, now we have three exam rooms, a room for EAP (employee assistance program) counseling and a lab, as well as a physical therapy room.”

The ease of scheduling an appointment, Lord said, has been a big plus for 4imprint employees.

“You can easily get an appointment,” he said. “You can go there before work, during work, during your lunch hour.”

Lord said the building also includes new office space, a new break area and additional meeting and collaboration facilities.

“As breakrooms go, this one is comfortable and gives a relaxed atmosphere for associates to have their lunch, a coffee, a conversation, you can even bring your laptop in there and work on things,” he said. “(Employees) want the other breakrooms (at the distribution center) to get a facelift so they all look like the new one.”

The feedback 4imprint leadership has received from associates on the expansion, Lord said, has been filled with excitement.

“They’re all the people that have been at the company the same amount of time that I have to see the growth – they’re all just happy to be a part of it,” he said.