BlankSlate just completed the new Red Hook Waterfront site and the results look great.

This is not your typical commercial real estate site. The website belongs to The O’Connell Organization, a family owned and operated real estate development company that is behind many of the large Red Hook warehouses. The company has a substantial presence in the community, participating in many civic and economic development activities. Their marketing approach mirrors their business approach: accentuate the neighborhood’s unique attributes and focusing on the community while also promoting the role they play. The website has a key role in this strategy, acting as a place to display available commercial listings, while also serving as a blog for the community.

BlankSlate was engaged to create the site and on-going content for the site’s blog, as well as to promote listings and raise awareness of Red Hook by placing in-blog ads and syndicating the site’s blog content on other well trafficked Brooklyn sites.

The listings on the site are comprised of retail spaces, offices and warehouses that can range from $1,000 to $25,000 per month. The listings pages are filled with photos and include all the expected property information. All of the fields are customizable in the site’s admin, enabling listings to be showcased as needed.

The blog focuses on not only on O’Connell’s buildings, but also on the tenants who occupy them. Tenant profiles give the public — and prospective tenants — a glimpse into the businesses who are occupying the buildings. After all, when it comes to marketing a neighborhood, it’s not just about the buildings, but who inhabits them – particularly when it comes to businesses. For example, tenants include Red Hook Winery and Horus Bronze, businesses in vastly different industries, but both of whom chose to locate in Red Hook.

The Red Hook waterfront is a unique New York City environment, due to its southern location directly across from lower Manhattan, its cobblestone streets, and large industrial warehouses, so capturing the neighborhood in both the site’s photography and blog content was a must.  The right person was needed to capture the mood.

Mitch Waxman, who currently writes for Brownstoner Queens and who runs The Newtown Pentacle, was hired to write the content and shoot the photography. He’s also a tour guide with a knack for photographing industrial areas.

WordPress was used to build the site. It’s an effective system for a project like this because it’s familiar to many, it’s simple, easy to update and maintain, and of course, it excels as a blogging platform.

When you browse redhookwaterfront.com, you will see a simply structured website that achieves its goals: it conveys the feeling of Red Hook, it provides a place for The O’Connell Organization to display its commercial listings, and it demonstrates that the tenants are as fundamental to Red Hook as the buildings themselves.

To learn more, contact us here.