TNT saw operating profit (EBIT) rise 2.6 per cent to 681m euros in the first half on sales up 9.6 per cent to 5.3bn euros.

BSH Home Appliances has made NYK Logistics its sole provider of logistics services for small trade customers, as well as handling 50 per cent of bulk deliveries into the distribution networks of BSH’s major retail customers.

It certainly seems as if the North East could be the next big sheds location.

Paper products manufacturing firm Sanita has taken an eight year lease on a 37,900 sq ft warehouse at St Modwen’s 230,000 sq ft Brockton Business Park, Telford, Shropshire.

A shortage of space for medium sized operations in Avonmouth has meant that two out of the three units to be speculatively developed by developer St Modwen at its Access 18 scheme have already been let.

Opus Land has started work on the refurbishment of the 360,000 sq ft former MFI factory site on Teesside.

RGD Thomas, a private Swansea investor, has paid £4m to buy the 141,117 sq ft former Panasonic Unit at Baglan Moors, Port Talbot, South Wales.

Birmingham-based Coltham Developments has paid almost £10m to buy Britvic Soft Drinks’ warehouse complex at Tamworth’s Centurion Park which it intends to redevelop to provide a 288,000 sq ft distribution centre.

UK rents increased by 2.1 per cent in the year to March 2007, according to Jones Lang LaSalle’s latest 50 Centres Report.

Stoford has secured a £40million “quick turnaround” to develop more than 625,000 sq ft of warehousing and distribution facilities on 36 acres of prime land in the East Midlands and Yorkshire.