ShipMonk cuts 67 jobs, closes Bay Shore warehouse

An international company that fills and ships orders for online retailers is closing its Bay Shore warehouse this month and eliminating nearly 70 jobs, according to a state regulatory filing. 

ShipMonk submitted a notice to the state Department of Labor saying it has begun laying off the 67 employees at its 93,800-square-foot facility at 5 Inez Dr.

The shutdown is to be completed by April 30 and comes at a time when the vacancy rate for industrial space on Long Island is the highest it has been in nearly a decade. 

A spokesperson for the Florida-based company didn’t respond to requests for comment this week.

With the closure of the Bay Shore warehouse, ShipMonk will have 11 company-owned facilities in California, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Texas and Nevada as well as in Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom and Czech Republic.

ShipMonk, a third-party logistics company offering fulfillment services to online businesses, was started in 2016 by then-college student Jan Bednar. 

ShipMonk recently opened its Nevada and Pennsylvania warehouses. Together, they total 1.5 million square feet and have 375 employees. As of last month, the company had 2,300 employees worldwide, according to a news release about the new warehouses.

ShipMonk closed a warehouse in Dayton, New Jersey, last year, resulting in the loss of 148 jobs, according to a notice filed in that state.

The closure of ShipMonk’s Bay Shore warehouse comes as various developers have proposed, and in some cases begun construction on, 56 warehouse projects across Long Island. Together, they total 18 million square feet, according to data compiled by Newsday from visits to building sites and government documents in September.

Warehouses, together with factories, make up the Island's industrial real estate market, which saw a higher vacancy rate in the three months ended March 31, based on a report from the commercial real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield.

The vacancy rate was 5.5% for all industrial space in Nassau and Suffolk counties, the highest level since 2017, said Dimitri Mastrogiannis, the firm's senior research analyst.

“Despite more developers breaking ground on new projects, the vacancy rate continues to climb, demand has softened and more existing space is becoming available,” Mastrogiannis said.

By Tory N. Parrish

tory.parrish@newsday.comToryParrish1

Tory N. Parrish covers retail and small business for Newsday. She has worked at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y.