SUPPLY CHAINS: Retailers Seeking More Warehouse Space to Stow Excess Inventory.

Warehouse owners say more retailers are looking to add storage capacity, both for goods now reaching their networks of stores and distribution centers and as they prepare to keep more inventory on hand long-term to guard against stock-outs.

Prologis Inc., the world’s biggest owner of warehouses by square footage, said in a recent market analysis that it expects an additional 800 million square feet of warehouse space to be needed beyond earlier projections to handle the excess inventories, about 300 million square feet of which has already been leased by tenants.

“We have specifically heard from customers who are looking at carrying more inventories and are leasing space,” said Chris Caton, managing director of global strategy and analytics at Prologis.

Just-in-time inventory worked fine when everything else was running smoothly, but those days are over.