Ronkonkoma woodworking firm ISP Millwork to move to Brentwood
ISP Millwork, founded by David McWilliams, pictured at the company's Ronkonkoma facility, will relocate operations to Brentwood. Credit: Newsday/Alejandra Villa Loarca
The Ronkonkoma-based woodworking firm ISP Millwork — which builds lux corporate offices and parts of East End homes — will move its operations to Brentwood this year.
ISP owner David McWilliams said that he plans to relocate from three buildings in Ronkonkoma to one warehouse and office space at 355 Crooked Hill Rd. in Brentwood, McWilliams told Newsday.
All of ISP's 141 employees will move with the business, McWilliams said, as ISP shifts its operations out of roughly 75,500 square feet across three adjacent Ronkonkoma buildings: 31 Howard Pl., 41 Howard Pl. and 50 Haynes Ct.
His new, roughly 80,000-square-foot building on Crooked Hill Road will let ISP fabricate and finish wood pieces in the same facility, rather than sending them via truck between buildings, which can risk damaging the wood walls, panels, shelves and doors, McWilliams said.
"It's just more efficient," he said. "Everything about the building is better. It's got more parking. It's got more office space. It's just terrific."
McWilliams spent more than three decades as a construction manager and was a founding member of JRM Construction, retiring from the company in December 2024.
But retirement hasn't stuck; McWilliams started ISP Millwork in 2021 and expanded in 2023 when he bought manufacturing equipment from Island Architectural Woodwork and moved into their offices after that company closed at the end of that year, woodworking publication Woodworking Network reported.
McWilliams started looking for a new building about eight months ago after the landlords of one of his buildings — he wouldn't say which — raised his rent. He signed a 10-year lease on the new property about a month ago, said Thomas DeLuca, a Melville-based managing director at the commercial real estate brokerage Cushman & Wakefield, who brokered the deal.
By the end of the year, McWilliams hopes to complete the move, which he said will cost an estimated $3.5 million. Credit: Newsday/Alejandra Villa Loarca
McWilliams hopes to move into the building by the end of the year. Moving all his specialty equipment isn't cheap — he estimates it will cost him $3.5 million. But the new building will help him cut his rent, air conditioning and electric bills, he added.
Plus, the new property is just off the Long Island Expressway, making it easier to ship finished pieces to clients in New York City. McWilliams said his past commercial clients have included big names like Coinbase's New York City offices and NBC's studio space at 30 Rockefeller Plaza.
McWilliams found his space amid a hot market for industrial real estate on Long Island, said Douglas Omstrom, an executive vice president with the brokerage JLL who represented the landlord Bridge Logistics Properties in the lease. A representative for Bridge Logistics Properties did not respond to a request for comment.
Industrial space has a 4.9% vacancy rate on Long Island, leaving a limited amount of space available for companies looking to move or expand in the region, according to a recent Cushman & Wakefield's report. Newer buildings tend to fill up fast, Omstrom added.
The Crooked Hill Road building is older; it was built in 1971, according to LoopNet. It was previously rented by the pet supply distribution company All Pet Distributors in the mid-2010s, according to Google Images of the property.
An apparel distributor operated out of the building in 2020, and was later accused of price gouging consumers for personal protective equipment during the pandemic and agreed to donate $450,000 worth of PPE to avoid prosecution, Newsday reported.
