Hot property: Brooklyn Park Interstate Center

Brooklyn Park Interstate Center 7700 68th Av. N., Brooklyn Park

Type: Industrial/warehouse Size: 91,730 square feet Year built: 1997 Sale price: $3.03 million Buyer: Andy's Best LLC

A Brooklyn Park paper products company has purchased a largely vacant warehouse building in the city and has signed a redevelopment agreement promising to add more employees there.

Blanks/USA, now headquartered at 8625 N. Xylon Court, will move its operations 3 miles south to the Brooklyn Park Interstate Center. It acquired the 15-year-old structure last month.

Blanks/USA produces security paper that can't be copied and die-cut paper products such as door hangers and table tents, as well as raffle tickets, folders and tab dividers.

Company owner Andy Ogren, under the entity Andy's Best LLC, bought the warehouse from international real estate investment trust RREEF on Feb. 17 for $3.03 million, Hennepin County records show.

A listing posted by CB Richard Ellis showed that the facility -- which boasts 20-foot clear ceiling heights -- had been offered for sale at $3.6 million and indicated 62,000 of its 91,730 square feet were vacant.

Blanks/USA's sales have grown more than 30 percent since 2006, Ogren told city economic development specialists, and once the Brooklyn Park Interstate Center was identified as a site that could accommodate the growth, he requested financial assistance to make necessary improvements on it.

This month the city's Economic Development Commission approved $74,000 in construction aid to Ogren as part of a redevelopment agreement to help pay for electrical and heating/air conditioning upgrades at the warehouse.

Now employing 43 people, Blanks/USA has promised to add 20 more employees within five to seven years as part of the agreement, which states that work on the upgrades must begin by June and be completed by December.