Former Master Lock Factory Will Be Sold at Auction
Missouri company's redevelopment plans for huge factory complex haven't panned out.
Master Lock campus in May 2020. Photo by Jeramey Jannene.
Just 15 months after acquiring Milwaukee’s former Master Lock manufacturing campus, with plans to return it to productive industrial use, the owner is putting the sprawling property up for auction.
The move creates additional uncertainty for a substantial legacy industrial facility in the middle of the city.
An online auction for the approximately 26-acre complex, located near W. Center and N. 32nd streets, is scheduled to begin July 31. The offering includes about 780,000 square feet of industrial space spread across four buildings.
St. Louis-based Commercial Development Company (CDC) acquired the property from Master Lock parent company Fortune Brands Innovations in May 2025 for $2.6 million.
At the time, company officials said they intended to reposition the vacant campus for manufacturers, warehouse operators and industrial storage businesses.
“Our acquisition of this retired manufacturing plant is the first step to restoring the property to productive use,” said Commercial Development executive vice president Adam Kovacs when the deal was announced.
But the second step never came.
CDC is now attempting to sell the entire campus through FRE Auctions. The auction company describes the property as a versatile industrial park suited for heavy manufacturing and has not publicly disclosed a minimum bid.
FRE’s “Online Auction Plus” format allows prospective buyers to submit offers containing contingencies, rather than requiring an entirely unconditional auction bid.
According to the listing, the property includes 10 loading docks, 10 drive-in doors, about seven acres of paved parking and an electrical supply of four megawatts. The complex is zoned IH (industrial heavy), the city’s most intensive industrial zoning category.
The largest structure is a five-story, 413,606-square-foot building equipped with three 20-ton freight elevators. Its floors have clear heights of almost 13 feet.
Another building contains approximately 311,000 square feet, four drive-in doors and three loading docks. A third offers approximately 55,000 square feet of space, a 13,125-square-foot mezzanine, six loading docks and ceilings up to 23 feet high.
The fourth building is a two-story, 45,780-square-foot structure with six drive-in doors.
Although the auction listing says the buildings were constructed between 1950 and 1981, portions of the larger Master Lock complex date to the early 20th century.
The property stretches from W. Center Street south to W. Meinecke Avenue and from the 30th Street Corridor railroad tracks west to N. 33rd Street. Most of the buildings are east of N. 32nd Street, while the western portion of the campus contains parking lots and vacant land.
Master Lock closed the factory at 2600 N. 32nd St. in March 2024 after operating at the site for more than eight decades. About 330 union jobs were eliminated, with production shifted to other North American facilities.
The company once employed about 1,300 workers at the campus, making it one of the largest private employers on Milwaukee’s north side. Then-President Barack Obama visited the plant in 2012 to promote domestic manufacturing.
Master Lock’s parent company, Fortune Brands Innovations, also closed the company’s Oak Creek corporate office and consolidated about 120 positions at Fortune’s headquarters in Deerfield, Illinois.
CDC markets itself as a specialist in redeveloping contaminated and obsolete industrial properties, but it has faced criticism over other properties where redevelopment has taken years or failed to occur.
Its Wisconsin portfolio included the former General Motors assembly plant in Janesville. CDC demolished the massive factory and proposed redeveloping the land as an industrial park, but much of the approximately 240-acre property has remained vacant.
Janesville officials ultimately pursued eminent domain after years of disputes over the property’s condition, environmental cleanup and redevelopment prospects. The city gained control of the former GM factory and neighboring JATCO properties in mid-2025 after authorizing a $3.5 million acquisition offer for CDC’s holdings.
The southern Wisconsin city is now pursuing a data center at the site.
The heavily secured Master Lock complex includes extensive fencing, controlled entrances and a guardhouse. The fencing became controversial in 2019, when city officials allowed Master Lock to close portions of the surrounding street grid and acquire nearby homes to create a buffer around the factory.
Visual reminders of the former manufacturer remain throughout the campus, including lock imagery incorporated into buildings, a large rooftop padlock and a walking path laid out in the shape of a lock.
CDC declined to comment on the auction.
News of the auction was first reported by Tom Daykin.
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