Warehouses are struggling to attract workers, and they're borrowing a tactic from luxury real estate to entice a new wave of employees
Mary Altaffer/AP ImagesWarehouses are trying to attract employees with luxury amenities.
- Warehouses are being built with luxury amenities to attract employees, according to The Wall Street Journal.
- Luxury amenities in the workplace have their roots in Silicon Valley tech campuses, but they've since expanded to other industries.
- The "amenities war" is also taking place in luxury real estate: Developers are turning to increasingly lavish offerings in their competition to draw in residents.
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Warehouses are using luxury amenities to attract workers, reported The Wall Street Journal.
With a low national unemployment rate and a rapidly growing e-commerce market, the pressure is on for warehouses across the US to attract and keep employees. Features including coffee bars, lounges, patios, discounted dining venues, gyms, and walking trails are being added to warehouses to make them more desirable to employees.
Just consider clothing company ASOS: According to The Journal's report, ASOS designed a one-million-square-foot distribution center in Georgia with amenities including two basketball courts, a soccer field, a gym, a pizza and grill station, and a pop-up nail bar. Other warehouse amenities, meanwhile, are being installed to promote the health and well-being of the workers. A warehouse in Tacoma, Washington was built by Prologis Inc. to include advanced air ventilation and water filtration systems.
Read more: A $34 million San Francisco mansion billed as a 'wellness home' has a sauna, yoga studio, and filtration system that changes all the air in the house every 2 hours
These so-called "amenities wars" are taking place across an array of industries.
As Business Insider's Lina Batarags previously reported, luxury real estate has gone amenities-happy to entice buyers. Consider 414 Light Street in Baltimore, an apartment tower that boasts a fireside retreat room, a game room, media room, entertainment kitchen and bar, yoga and meditation rooms, and a business lounge. And then there's the Oceanwide Plaza in Los Angeles, which, upon completion, will include a two-acre "sky park" 100 feet in the air with two dog parks, a basketball court, lawns, a swimming pool, and a running track.