Negotiations on new Gympie Bunnings neighbour underway

Commercial and industrial development is taking off across the region but in particular in the industrial and commercial zones on the southern outskirts of Gympie, with a number of large scale redevelopments and new business projects underway.

Bunnings will remain separate from the new three shop development next door, although negotations for the new tenants are underway.

Bunnings itself will not be among the tenants of a new commercial development adjacent to the hardware giant’s Gympie store although who will actually call it home is still uncertain.

Discussions are reportedly underway between several companies and real estate company Collier International, which is handling the potential leases for the property, where early construction work has begun.

“We’re in talks and negotiating with users at the moment,” Collier International’s spokesman Jesse Howitt said on Monday.

Despite the Collier’s global reach, Mr Howitt said the heavy preference for the new tenants was for them to be “local or national”.

Three retail shops will be built in the development which broke ground this month.

The building was originally approved in 2012 as part of the Bunnings development.

Bunnings itself will not be involved in any of the new shops.

Supercheap Auto’s new home at the corner of Channon St and the Bruce Highway on the old Brodies site is well underway, but whether it will be joined by a funeral parlour remains to be seen.

The block of land where construction is now underway near Bunnings was sold to Cooloola Enterprises in 2014 for $1.32 million, before selling again in 2020 to Marooka-based company Fajima for $1.26 million.

The project is one of several large commercial or industrial developments underway in Gympie.

Long time Gympie car dealership Madills has started construction of its new showroom directly opposite the work near Bunnings, at the corner of the Bruce Highway and Hall Rd.

Madill Mazda dealer principal Adam Madill said the company plans to have the doors of the multi-million dollar centre open “early in 2022”.

A new showroom, service centre and outdoor display are included in the designs.

A few hundred metres away at the Bunsworth Industrial Park that Harvey Norman calls home, construction is well advanced on a new showroom for an as-yet unidentified tenant on Edwin Campion Drive.

The leasing of the new shops near Bunnings is being undertaken by Collier International, but the preference is for local or national companies to call it home.

On the other side of the drive, macadamia company CL Macs has proposed expanding its own business with a showroom; this application is still pending.

Work is well underway further north on the highway, too.

Supercheap Auto’s new home at the corner of the Bruce Highway and Channon St has been under construction since June.

Questions remain over who will occupy the eastern side of the block.

Development approval has been granted for a string of retail shops but Gympie Regional Council has been asked to allow a small funeral parlour be opened instead.

The application is still awaiting a decision by the council.