Who Is RAD LAB?

RAD LAB was started by Philip Auchettl, David Loewenstein, and Jason Grauten, all honors graduates of the NewSchool of Architecture + Design. Their senior thesis project wasn't meant to become a business. It became Quartyard, a shipping container park in downtown San Diego that's still running today. That project set the direction for everything RAD LAB has built since: take an unused or overlooked space, drop in modified shipping containers, and turn it into something a neighborhood actually uses.

🇺🇸 Click here for an automated shipping container quote from USA Containers

Quartyard Started as a Class Project and Became a City Landmark

Quartyard opened in 2015 on a vacant, blighted lot in San Diego's East Village. Before RAD LAB got involved, the site had sat empty for years, collecting trash and doing nothing for the surrounding neighborhood. The team raised roughly $60,000 through Kickstarter and built out a coffee shop, a beer garden, a dog park, an event space, and offices, all inside retrofitted shipping containers.

When the lease on the original lot ran out, RAD LAB didn't tear the project down. They relocated it. About 90 percent of the original structures were moved to a new site 500 feet away for Quartyard II, an 11,000 square foot space running on a three year lease. For comparison, standard construction demolition typically reuses around 40 percent of materials. RAD LAB more than doubled that rate just by building with containers in the first place.

Why Containers Made Sense for a Temporary Site

The container format wasn't a style choice. It solved a real problem. Because Quartyard sat on leased land with a limited timeline, RAD LAB needed a building system that could come apart and go back together somewhere else without demolition. Welded container structures don't allow for that, so the firm developed its own turnbuckle and locking systems to join containers mechanically instead. That decision is a big part of why the Quartyard move worked as smoothly as it did, and it's become a signature of how RAD LAB approaches every container project since.

Co-founder David Loewenstein has also pointed to building information modeling as a key part of scaling up from a single container structure to something more complex. The software let the team coordinate between "interior designers, MEP and structural engineers, lighting consultants, HVAC specialists" on the same set of plans, which matters once a project moves past a simple box and starts layering in real building systems.

From Fast Food to a Boutique Hotel

RAD LAB's container work isn't limited to parks. In early 2020, the firm designed Taco Bell's first shipping container restaurant in Shelby Township, Michigan, combining repurposed containers with conventional light frame construction. The result leaned into an industrial look with a black exterior and pop art murals, a distinctly different fast food building than anything the chain had built before.

In Waco, Texas, RAD LAB took on an abandoned, half finished container building and turned it into Hotel Herringbone, a boutique hotel with retail space, restaurants, and a public courtyard. The project picked up a stalled container build and finished it into something the surrounding community actually uses, which is the same pattern the firm started with at Quartyard.

Small Containers, Real Impact

Not every RAD LAB project is a full development. Some are just as useful on a smaller scale. The firm converted a single 40 foot container into two private office spaces, 160 square feet each, complete with separate entrances and a green roof to cut down on interior heat gain. It's a simple example of how one container can solve a very specific space problem without a full construction project.

RAD LAB also worked with the nonprofit Think Dignity to build a Transitional Container Center in San Diego's East Village. Four repurposed containers now hold 304 lockers where people experiencing homelessness can securely store their belongings during the day. That storage lets people job hunt, attend appointments, use public transportation, and work toward stable housing without carrying everything they own with them.

What RAD LAB Proves About Building With Containers

Across parks, restaurants, hotels, offices, and social services, RAD LAB keeps landing on the same result: a shipping container is a legitimate starting point for real architecture, not just a novelty. The firm's projects show what's possible when containers are treated as a serious building material, modular, movable, and reusable at a rate that beats standard construction by a wide margin. Whether the goal is a temporary pop-up or a permanent building, RAD LAB's portfolio is a solid case study in what a stack of steel boxes can become in the right hands.

The basic idea behind container hydroponic farming is fairly simple. Start with a standard shipping container, insulate it, add water and electrical service, and install the lighting, climate controls, and growing equipment needed to create a small controlled environment.

What happens inside is considerably more sophisticated.

How Much Can a Shipping Container Farm Grow?

A standard 40-foot shipping container provides around 320 square feet of floor space, but container farms make much greater use of that room by growing vertically.

Instead of spreading plants across a single level, growers install racks, panels, or vertical towers that allow plants to grow along the walls. Depending on the design, thousands of plants can fit into a container with a relatively small footprint.

Freight Farms’ Greenery S, for example, is built inside a 40-foot container and includes 8,800 plant sites. The company says the system can produce between two and six tons of food annually and has been used to test more than 500 crop varieties.

Lettuce and other leafy greens are some of the most common choices because they grow relatively quickly and work well in hydroponic systems. Herbs, microgreens, edible flowers, brassicas, and some root vegetables can also be grown this way.

And growers are beginning to push beyond the crops most commonly associated with vertical farming.

Strawberries are just one example.

How Hydroponics Work Inside a Shipping Container Farm

Most shipping container farms use hydroponics rather than soil.

Plant roots receive water mixed with the nutrients they need to grow. Depending on the system, the nutrient solution may be delivered through drip irrigation, channels, or another method before being collected and circulated through the system again.

This closed-loop approach can make very efficient use of water. Freight Farms, for example, lists average water consumption for its Greenery S at about five gallons per day.

Sensors and control systems also allow growers to keep a close eye on what is happening inside the container. Temperature, humidity, lighting, water chemistry, and other conditions can be monitored and adjusted instead of being left to whatever the weather happens to bring that day.

Some systems can be checked remotely, allowing an operator to monitor farm conditions through software without being inside the container around the clock.

The technology does not eliminate the work of farming. Seeds still need to be started, seedlings moved into the growing system, crops harvested, equipment cleaned, and plants regularly checked.

It simply gives the grower much greater control over the conditions in which that work takes place.

Strawberries Show What Container Farming Can Do

Lettuce, herbs, and microgreens are natural fits for container farms. They grow quickly, require relatively little space, and have been grown hydroponically for years.

Strawberries are more complicated.

GetBlok Farms in West Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, offers a good example of how growers are taking on that challenge. The company operates hydroponic farms inside insulated 40-foot shipping containers, where it has grown crops including lettuce, arugula, carrots, turnips, and herbs throughout the year.

More recently, GetBlok began dedicating one of its containers to hydroponic strawberries.

By March 2026, strawberries were ripening inside the container months before Pennsylvania’s normal outdoor strawberry season. Instead of relying on spring weather, GetBlok controls the light, humidity, temperature, and water chemistry surrounding the plants.

Getting there took some experimenting.

The company had previously tried growing strawberries alongside its leafy greens, but the fruit needed different conditions. According to GetBlok co-founder Vinnie Lima, those early berries did not reach the size or ripen in the way the company wanted.

GetBlok eventually gave the strawberries their own container and began testing different varieties, nutrients, and growing conditions. Trials for the dedicated strawberry operation began in August 2025. By the following winter, the farm was harvesting and selling several varieties, including Albion, San Andreas, Portola, and Seascape.

There was another problem to solve: pollination.

There are no bees naturally moving from flower to flower inside a sealed shipping container, so GetBlok had to develop its own method for pollinating the strawberry plants. The farm tested several approaches before settling on a technique that produced more consistent fruit.

That makes strawberries a useful example of both the possibilities and the limitations of container farming.

A controlled environment gives growers the ability to change temperature, moisture, lighting, and nutrients to suit a particular crop. But more control does not necessarily mean a crop is easier to grow. Sometimes it means the operator has to recreate processes that would normally happen outdoors on their own.

Climate Control Makes the Farm Possible

One of the biggest challenges of growing inside a shipping container is also one of the most obvious: the container is made of steel.

An unmodified container can become extremely hot in direct summer sun and lose heat quickly in cold weather. Those swings are the opposite of what most crops need.

That makes insulation one of the most important parts of a shipping container farm conversion.

Insulation creates a thermal barrier between the growing area and outside conditions. Heating, cooling, ventilation, and dehumidification systems then maintain the environment the plants require.

How much climate control is needed depends heavily on location.

A shipping container farm in Minnesota will face a different set of challenges than one in Arizona or Florida. In either case, good insulation helps keep outside temperatures from dictating what happens inside.

Commercial container farms can be designed for surprisingly wide temperature ranges. Freight Farms rates the Greenery S for operation in outdoor temperatures ranging from -40°F to 120°F.

Of course, keeping plants comfortable when the outside temperature is at one of those extremes takes energy.

What Does a Shipping Container Farm Cost?

There is no single price for converting a shipping container into a farm.

A custom project might start with an empty new or used 40-foot container and add each component separately. That can include insulation, vertical growing equipment, LED lighting, HVAC, plumbing, pumps, electrical work, sensors, water treatment, and control systems.

How elaborate those systems become will have a major effect on the final cost.

The other option is to purchase a turnkey container farm where much of that work has already been done.

Those units can be a significant investment. Freight Farms currently lists its Greenery S at $215,000 for an outright purchase. The company also offers a farm-as-a-service option starting at about $3,000 per month through a financing partner.

A grower building a simpler system from an empty container may spend considerably less, but the price of the container itself is only one piece of the budget.

The real calculation also needs to include site preparation, electrical service, water access, climate-control equipment, grow systems, permits, labor, and ongoing operating expenses.

Electricity Is a Major Part of the Equation

Sunlight is free. LED grow lights are not.

Lighting is one of the biggest differences between a field farm and a fully enclosed container farm. Plants growing inside a steel container depend heavily on artificial light, often for many hours every day.

HVAC equipment also has to maintain temperature and humidity, while pumps, fans, sensors, and water-treatment equipment add to the electrical load.

Freight Farms lists power consumption for the Greenery S between 151 and 350 kWh per day, with actual use depending on factors such as crop type, humidity, and outside climate.

That makes location and insulation especially important.

If an HVAC system spends all summer fighting extreme heat or all winter trying to keep an poorly insulated container warm, operating costs can add up quickly.

Crop selection matters too.

Fast-growing greens allow farmers to move several harvests through the same growing space. Strawberries take a different approach. They require more precise management and take longer to produce, but they can offer access to a higher-value crop, particularly during times of year when locally grown berries are difficult to find.

At GetBlok, that means producing Pennsylvania-grown strawberries during winter and early spring instead of waiting for the traditional late-May growing season to begin.

Why Put a Farm in a Shipping Container?

Consistency is a big part of the appeal.

Traditional agriculture depends on rain, temperatures, sunlight, soil conditions, pests, and the length of the local growing season. Indoor farming removes many of those variables.

A properly designed shipping container farm can create similar growing conditions in January and July.

It can also put food production much closer to the people eating it.

A shipping container does not require acres of farmland. Depending on local zoning and site requirements, a farm can potentially be placed on a relatively small property near restaurants, grocery stores, schools, universities, or the communities it serves.

GetBlok is a good example. Its operation sits in Aliquippa, just outside Pittsburgh, rather than on a large traditional farm. Its original container farms were established in an urban setting with a focus on producing fresh food locally.

That shorter distance between farm and customer can be particularly useful for crops that are best eaten fresh.

What Does a Shipping Container Farm Need on Site?

A container farm has a small footprint, but that does not mean it can go anywhere without preparation.

The container first needs a firm, level surface. Keeping it level becomes particularly important once the interior contains water tanks, pumps, growing racks, and drainage systems.

There also needs to be enough space for the delivery truck to position the container and for operators to access the doors and equipment afterward.

Utilities are another major consideration.

Hydroponic farms need a dependable water source as well as enough electrical capacity to operate the lights, HVAC equipment, pumps, fans, sensors, and other systems. Some commercial setups may require electrical upgrades before the farm can operate.

Local zoning, permits, drainage, and building requirements should also be checked before the container arrives.

Planning for those details early is much easier than trying to relocate or redesign a completed farm later.

Why Shipping Containers Work Well for Indoor Farming

Shipping containers were never designed to grow food, but many of the same characteristics that make them useful for cargo also make them a practical shell for indoor agriculture.

They are strong, enclosed, transportable, and built to standardized dimensions.

A 40-foot container gives the builder a predictable structure to work with instead of requiring an entirely new building. Once it has been properly insulated and modified, the interior can be designed specifically around the crop and growing system.

Used shipping containers can also be an option when exterior appearance is less important than structural condition. For a farm conversion, the priorities are a sound container that can be made weather-tight, insulated, and safely modified for the necessary utilities and equipment.

Containers also make the idea modular.

An operator can start with one unit and potentially add additional containers later, with each one providing its own controlled growing environment. Individual containers could even be set up for different crops, as GetBlok found when strawberries needed different conditions from its leafy greens.

A Different Kind of Second Life for Shipping Containers

Container farming is still evolving.

Lighting is becoming more efficient. Sensors and software are giving growers more information about what is happening around their plants. Automation can handle some routine adjustments, while farmers continue experimenting with crops that would once have seemed unlikely candidates for a steel box.

GetBlok’s strawberries are a good example.

A shipping container cannot change Pennsylvania’s growing season outside its doors. Inside, however, growers can create an entirely different set of conditions and harvest strawberries while fields nearby are still waiting for spring.

That does not mean every crop makes financial or practical sense in a container.

Anyone considering a shipping container farm still has to answer some basic questions: What will the conversion cost? How much electricity will it use? What does the site need? Which crops work in the available space? And is there enough local demand to make the operation worthwhile?

Get those pieces right, and a shipping container that once spent its life moving cargo can take on a very different job: growing food year-round, sometimes just a few miles from the people who will eat it.

Frequently Asked Questions About Shipping Container Farms

What Can You Grow in a Shipping Container Farm?

Leafy greens, lettuce, herbs, microgreens, edible flowers, brassicas, and certain root vegetables are common choices. Commercial systems have tested hundreds of crop varieties, and operations such as GetBlok show that fruiting crops like strawberries can also be grown when the system is designed around their needs.

How Much Does a Shipping Container Farm Cost?

Costs vary widely depending on how the farm is built. A custom conversion may start with an empty new or used container and add equipment separately. Complete commercial systems can cost considerably more.

Do Shipping Container Farms Need Water?

Yes, although hydroponic systems can make very efficient use of it by recirculating water instead of constantly replacing it. Water requirements depend on the farm design and crops being grown.

Do Shipping Container Farms Use a Lot of Electricity?

They can. LED lighting and climate control account for a large part of the energy demand, while pumps, fans, sensors, and other equipment also require electricity. Climate, insulation, crop choice, and equipment efficiency can all affect the amount used.

Can a Shipping Container Farm Operate in Winter?

Yes. With sufficient insulation and climate-control equipment, container farms can operate throughout the winter. GetBlok’s hydroponic strawberries in Pennsylvania are one example of how a controlled container environment can produce crops well outside their traditional local growing season.

The Manteca City Council has accepted a donated shipping container — 8 feet by 40 feet, refurbished into an insulated, heated, and air-conditioned kennel with secure indoor and outdoor space for up to 10 dogs — from a Stockton-based company. It’s now installed at the Manteca Navigation Center, 555 Industrial Park Drive, the city’s low-barrier homeless shelter operated by His Way Refuge Center

Why it exists

Manteca found that people experiencing homelessness are extremely reluctant to use a shelter if it means giving up their pet. That tracks with what homeless-services research has found more broadly — pet ownership is one of the most commonly cited reasons unsheltered individuals decline a shelter bed. For many, a dog is the one relationship they haven’t lost.

The Navigation Center itself runs on a housing-first, low-barrier model: shelter beds, meals, showers, hygiene supplies, transportation help, case management, and behavioral health support, all aimed at moving people into stable housing rather than just off the street for a night. The city’s own program page now lists “pet wash station and kennel services” among those offerings — a small addition that represents a real shift in how the shelter was designed to work.

🇺🇸 Click here for an automated shipping container quote from USA Containers

How it works

The kennel isn’t a drop-off point. Residents keep their dogs with them during the day and use the secure kennel overnight while they sleep in the shelter. Feeding, bathing, and general care of the animal stays with the owner — this is co-housing for pets, not a boarding service. The Manteca Animal Services Division handles licensing, vaccinations, and low-cost spay/neuter for the dogs staying there, and maintaining those records can help residents down the line if they move into housing that has its own pet requirements.

The bottom line

A single donated container closes a gap that has quietly turned away people who would otherwise have accepted help — and it's the kind of low-cost, easy-to-replicate change other cities could copy without much of a budget fight.

The borrowers are affiliates of Stonemont Financial Group and Cerberus Capital Management, two firms that have been active consolidators in the IOS space. The new loan refinances an existing $486 million mortgage on the same portfolio — a roughly $186 million increase that reflects both the growth in the platform’s value and continued lender appetite for the asset class, even as broader commercial real estate credit remains selective.

What Industrial Outdoor Storage Actually Is

IOS properties aren’t warehouses — they’re paved or improved outdoor lots used to stage shipping containers, truck trailers, chassis, construction equipment, and other rolling stock that don’t need to sit inside a building. As e-commerce volumes have grown and supply chains have leaned harder on speed, these lots have become a critical, if unglamorous, layer of logistics infrastructure: the staging ground that keeps last-mile delivery networks moving. Because they’re cheap to build relative to warehouses but hard to site near dense population centers (zoning and land-use restrictions are tight), well-located IOS portfolios have become scarcer — and more valuable — than the asset type’s humble reputation would suggest.

Why Lenders Are Circling This Sector

Paul Sisson, head of credit at Realterm, framed the deal as part of a broader shift in who’s willing to finance this asset class: “Borrowers are continuing to seek lenders with a deep understanding of the industrial real estate and logistics sectors.” That specificity matters. As traditional banks have scaled back commercial real estate lending amid tighter capital requirements and elevated interest rates, specialized lenders — REITs like Starwood Property Trust and sector-focused managers like Realterm — have stepped in to fill the gap, particularly for niche property types that generalist lenders don’t fully understand how to underwrite.

Why This Matters Beyond One Deal

A single $672 million refinancing is notable on its own, but the bigger signal is directional: institutional capital is still willing to write large checks against industrial outdoor storage even in a commercial real estate lending environment that’s been broadly cautious. For an asset class that barely existed as an institutional category five years ago, that’s a meaningful data point — both for owners of similar portfolios weighing their own financing options, and for lenders deciding whether to build out sector expertise in a niche that’s clearly not niche anymore.

Bottom Line

Starwood Property Trust and Realterm’s $672 million loan to Stonemont Financial Group and Cerberus Capital Management affiliates — refinancing a 78-property, 830-acre outdoor storage portfolio across 33 markets — underscores how central industrial outdoor storage has become to U.S. supply chain infrastructure, and how specialized lenders are positioning themselves to serve a sector that generalist banks have been slower to embrace.

It’s a fast follow-up to the brand’s first McKinney “Can,” which opened in April 2025 at 1681 N. Hardin Blvd. and quickly built a following on the strength of pressed-to-order sliders, waffle fries, and milkshakes. Both locations are run by the same local operator, Serendipity Provisions LLC, whose representative Chris Raleigh said of the brand’s original McKinney debut: “We were drawn to McKinney because it’s a historic town with a loyal population, which makes bringing Smalls Sliders here significant.” A second location in the same city, just over a year later, is the clearest sign yet that the bet paid off.

🇺🇸 Click here for an automated shipping container quote from USA Containers

Like every Smalls Sliders location, the new Custer Rd spot is built inside a “Can” — the brand’s signature 750-square-foot, Smorange™-colored shipping container, outfitted with a walk-up window and a drive-thru. The city approved the drive-thru for this location, with the speaker box positioned roughly 260 feet from the nearest single-family home to manage noise for neighbors.

The menu keeps things narrow on purpose: fresh, never-frozen, all-beef patties grilled to order, served single- or double-stacked with American cheese, pickle, and the brand’s proprietary “Smauce” on a toasted bun. Sides are limited to seasoned waffle fries — plain or smothered in queso — plus a short milkshake lineup (chocolate, vanilla, cookies & cream) and a grilled cheese for the burger-averse. At the first McKinney Can, a single slider ran about $2.79, though guests should confirm current pricing at the new location.

McKinney’s second Can is part of a broader growth run for the brand. As of March 2026, Smalls Sliders had more than 300 Cans sold or in development across six sold-out states, with over 50 locations already open. The company’s stated mission — to “serve cheeseburger sliders better than anyone else” — has translated into a simple, repeatable format: small footprint, small menu, big drive-thru throughput.

For McKinney residents, the practical upshot is a second, more convenient option on the north side of town along N. Custer Road, joining the original Hardin Blvd. location. Whether Smalls Sliders repeats the “Can Drop” energy of its first McKinney opening for this one remains to be confirmed — but the pattern from the brand’s other markets suggests an opening-day line, a festive first-guest moment, and a drive-thru that will be busy from hour one

Bottom line: Smalls Sliders opens its second McKinney “Can” on August 18, 2026, at 1700 N. Custer Rd. — a shipping-container drive-thru serving cooked-to-order cheeseburger sliders, waffle fries, and shakes from the same local team behind the brand’s first McKinney location.

The vote is a committee-level recommendation, not a final law. Like most land-use changes in Beaufort County, it still needs two more votes before it officially takes effect.

🇺🇸 Click here for an automated shipping container quote from USA Containers

Why Farmers Pushed for This

Traditional agricultural buildings — pole barns, metal storage structures, cold-storage units — can cost tens of thousands of dollars once site work, permitting, and construction are factored in. Repurposed shipping containers, by contrast, are already weatherproof, secure, and comparatively inexpensive to acquire and place, which is why they’ve become an increasingly common option for farmers nationwide looking to add storage, equipment shelter, or workspace without a major capital outlay.

What the Amendment Does — and Doesn’t — Settle Yet

The catch, in Beaufort County and many other jurisdictions, is that community development and zoning codes were largely written before shipping containers became a mainstream building option. Without a specific provision addressing them, containers on agricultural land can fall into a legal gray area — technically a structure, but not one the code clearly permits, sizes, or regulates. That ambiguity can leave farmers exposed to code enforcement action even when the container itself isn’t causing any real problem. Amending the code to explicitly allow — and define rules for — agricultural shipping containers closes that gap.

What’s confirmed is the core direction: the county is moving to formally recognize shipping containers as a legitimate structure type for agricultural use. For comparison, other counties nationally have taken a range of approaches, from permitting containers outright with design standards to requiring a special-use permit — where Beaufort County’s final language lands in that range will determine how much practical flexibility farmers actually gain.

What’s Next

The amendment now heads toward further consideration by Beaufort County Council. Until the full Council acts, farmers should treat the current code as still in effect and consult the Beaufort County Planning Department before placing a shipping container on agricultural land.

Why This Matters Beyond the Farm

Land-use policy might not sound like exciting local news, but changes like this one shape what’s actually financially possible for the working farms that supply Beaufort County’s food system and help preserve its rural character amid rapid coastal development. Lowering the cost barrier to basic infrastructure — storage, equipment shelter, cold storage — can be the difference between a small farm staying viable and a farmer deciding it’s not worth the overhead. It also reflects a broader pattern playing out in county governments nationwide: land-use codes slowly catching up to lower-cost building methods that didn’t exist, or weren’t common, when those codes were first written.

The Bottom Line

Beaufort County’s Natural Resources Committee has signaled clear support for letting farmers use shipping containers for agricultural purposes — a change that could meaningfully cut the cost of on-farm storage. The measure isn’t law yet; it still needs to clear full County Council. But the committee’s August 3, 2026 vote marks a real step toward giving Lowcountry farmers a faster, cheaper building option. For updates on the ordinance’s progress, follow Beaufort County Council’s public meeting agendas and continuing coverage from The Island Packet.