The 130,143-square-foot industrial warehouse at 2996 Hanson St. in Fort Myers recently sold for $17.65 million. The property once served as the launch site where Michelob Ultra was named ahead of its test-market debut.
David Dorsey
The Fort Myers warehouse where Michelob Ultra was first named and launched changed hands for $17.65 million.
George Cibula, a longtime part-time Bonita Springs resident whose brother owns Doc’s Beach House restaurant, has built his career developing and leasing industrial buildings in the Chicago area. His purchase of the 130,143-square-foot building at 2996 Hanson St. gave him something increasingly rare: a heavy industrial property in the heart of Fort Myers, at the intersection of Hanson Street and Old Metro Parkway, with 13 acres of land.
Cibula’s company, Hanson Celtic LLC, a subsidiary of DarwinPW Realty, will begin searching for tenants with the help of Lee & Associates Naples-Fort Myers broker Bob Johnston, who represented both parties in the real estate transaction that closed June 29.
“One of the reasons we liked this property is it’s so well built and so well located,” Cibula said. “They did a heck of a job.”
Cibula’s company owns about 80 industrial buildings across Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin, along with a 13,000-square-foot warehouse in Naples with two tenants. The portfolio includes about 300 tenants, ranging from 500-square-foot barbershop suppliers to manufacturers occupying up to 350,000 square feet, including one that makes cups for McDonald’s.
Cibula said the property’s size, location near Interstate 75, heavy industrial zoning and well-designed truck docks made it especially attractive, noting that older warehouses often lack adequate loading facilities.
“These Budweiser guys, they put marble floors in the offices,” he said.
A Lee & Associates sign advertises the industrial warehouse at 2996 Hanson St. in Fort Myers following its recent sale to Hanson Celtic LLC.
David Dorsey
“It’s a bigger deal for us to buy. But we liked the market. There are a lot of barriers to entry to build industrial in Florida. Getting an existing building is great.”
Suncoast Beverage Sales, the largest Anheuser-Busch distributor in Southwest Florida, operated on Hanson Street beginning in 1993 under the leadership of Mike Mitchell and later his son, Tim Mitchell.
Suncoast bought Coastal Beverage in Naples in 2020 and Peace River Distributing in Punta Gorda in 2021.
In 2022, Suncoast Beverage had a deal in place to build a 397,000-square-foot headquarters at 4480 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. That year, Suncoast sold its four existing industrial properties. The buildings in Punta Gorda, the Hanson Street warehouse in Fort Myers and two in Naples sold for $35 million to AB Sunport II LLC, which is owned by Dallas-based Columnar Investments.
Suncoast Beverage leased the properties back until moving into its current headquarters in 2025.
Of the four industrial buildings, only one in Naples remains in Columnar’s portfolio: 4747 Progress Ave. The 108,218-square-foot property is listed by Lee & Associates for $33 million, illustrating how industrial property values have skyrocketed over the past four years.
“It was purely an investment,” said Sean Froelich, managing director and chief operating officer of Columnar. “We bought the properties from Tim. He needed a buyer. He leased it back from us for three and a half years. As he moved out, we bought all four buildings for one price.”
Even as the new owner of the Hanson Street warehouse, Cibula said he didn’t realize the beer milestone that occurred inside it. A plaque once hung in one of the offices while Suncoast Beverage occupied the building.
“Michelob Ultra: Born here by August A. Busch III, July 2001,” the plaque read.
A commemorative plaque marks the Fort Myers warehouse where Michelob Ultra was named by August A. Busch III in July 2001 before the beer’s test-market launch.
David Dorsey
Michelob Ultra first launched in three test markets during the height of the Atkins diet craze in 2002. “Lose the carbs, not the taste,” the marketing slogan said. Denver; Tucson, Arizona; and Fort Myers were the first three test markets. But a year before the launch, a group that included Suncoast Beverage and Anheuser-Busch executives gathered in the Hanson Street warehouse conference room to taste-test the beer and brainstorm names for it.
“That’s where they came up with the name, Ultra,” Johnston said. “They were taste-testing beers. It wasn’t brewed there. But the dignitaries were there. They were tasting the beer, and they said, ‘Let’s name it Michelob Ultra.’”
The warehouse’s climate-control features were another selling point, Johnston said. The warehouse room can be cooled to 68 degrees, while the keg area can be chilled to 28 degrees.
The rest of the warehouse could be climate-controlled with a $1.5 million investment, but Cibula said he would rather secure a tenant before making that upgrade.
“I should have bought industrial properties there 30 years ago,” Cibula said. “We were doing real well in Chicago, and you didn’t have the growth in Southwest Florida until six-to-seven years ago.”