The Lucky Strike Facility (LSF) located in Reidsville, North Carolina, celebrated its official ribbon cutting on Friday, November 4th alongside numerous partners and dignitaries. Ascendency Ventures purchased LSF in May of 2022 with plans to utilize a mainstay of the community, the former Commonwealth Tobacco Company, and bring it back to life through its re-purposed and re-imagined direction.
Through its mission, LSF plans to revitalize Reidsville by bringing new e-commerce, logistics, and technology-enabled jobs and opportunities to replace the manufacturing jobs that left years ago with the closing of the building’s former occupant. To date, a total of $8.5 million has been invested in the Triad region and over 50 jobs have been created, with an additional 50 jobs to come.
“We are ecstatic to see the Lucky Strike Facility preserved and reused in such an innovative way,” said Leigh Cockram, Director, Rockingham County Economic Development. “The jobs and wages the revitalization of this building has created and will continue to bring to our area, are an integral piece to a prosperous economy in Rockingham County.”
LSF is currently led by Evans Richards, CEO of reVend, LLC, who runs the overall e-commerce ecosystem at LSF and is a Partner of Ascendency Ventures; Coren Seglem, partner of Ascendency Ventures and CEO of LSF; and Tuan Ho, founding Partner in Lucky Storage and heads up technology initiatives at LSF.
LSF currently houses several tenants including reVend, LLC, Warehouse Republic, a Texas-based third-party logistics provider, and Lucky Storage, a decentralized cloud storage provider for university and research institutions, with several more to come.
Ecommerce, Fulfillment and Logistics
The principals of Ascendency are also the principals of an e-commerce ecosystem that includes companies such as reVend, LLC (specialized direct-to-consumer third-party logistics services provider), eVend, LLC (direct-to-consumer marketplace) and Dreadnought Logistics (a specialized motor carrier).
Warehouse Republic is a full-service third-party logistics that focuses on business-to-business, reverse logistics, and special needs projects. We specialize in serving customers that require omni-channel marketplace warehousing solutions. To date, seven jobs have already been created with the anticipation of an additional 15 to 20 positions with average wages just under three times minimum wage.
Technology Initiatives
Lucky Storage (decentralized cloud storage provider) has already started university and research data storage operations for its initial clients the Shoah Foundation and Starling Lab (a collaboration between University of Southern California and Stanford University). More information on Lucky Storage can be found here: https://hub.filecoin.io/case-study-lucky-storage
For more information please contact Tara Martin, Economic Development Marketing Manager at tmartin@co.rockingham.nc.us.
