Costco’s long-talked-about Franklin warehouse just moved from rumor mill to reality check. The retailer has officially closed on roughly 20 acres at the northwest corner of South 27th Street and West Drexel Avenue, locking in a prime site next to Northwestern Mutual’s Franklin campus and pushing plans for Milwaukee County’s first Costco well down the field.
The deal follows months of city planning and rezoning work to carve the site out of Northwestern Mutual’s larger property. With those local approvals in place, the land sale removes one of the biggest remaining obstacles between Costco and a grand opening on the county’s south side.
On May 4, 2026, Milwaukee Business Journal reported that the purchase had officially closed and identified Northwestern Mutual as the seller. The outlet noted that the transaction completes a parcel split city staff had been preparing for development and that the Franklin site is one piece of a broader Costco push to add new locations across southeast Wisconsin.
Site Details, Approvals and Scale
According to City of Franklin plan materials, the Costco site is part of 2710 W. Drexel Avenue and was pitched to the Plan Commission as the future home of an approximately 168,000-square-foot warehouse. Plans call for a fueling station on-site along with room for outlot development.
The planning packet shows the land being subdivided from the larger Northwestern Mutual campus, with city actions in late 2025 establishing a Planned Development Overlay tailored to Costco’s project. That approval process was not exactly an overnight affair; local officials spent months working through design, zoning and land-use questions before greenlighting the warehouse and related improvements.
Hoodline covered the plan-approval process in 2025 as the proposal moved through Franklin’s boards and commissions on its way to final sign-off.
Timeline and Next Steps
City officials told TMJ4 that, now that the land deal is done, construction could start during the 2026 building season. The goal on Costco’s side is a late-2026 opening, assuming the remaining boxes get checked on schedule.
TMJ4 reported that final site-plan approvals, stormwater work and traffic mitigation measures still have to be buttoned up before any shovels hit the ground. Developers and city staff are planning public site-plan review meetings as engineering details are refined and permit applications come in.
What Residents Can Expect
Local leaders have said they expect the project to pull more commercial development toward the Drexel Avenue corridor and to generate new jobs and sales-tax revenue for Franklin. CBS58 reported that the Franklin Common Council signed off on key approvals in November 2025, effectively clearing the way for the warehouse and its future outlots.
Residents, of course, will not just see new storefronts. As site plans advance, people living and driving near South 27th Street and West Drexel Avenue should be ready for more truck traffic and more shopper congestion in the area, particularly once the doors open.
With the deed now recorded, the focus shifts to permits, final engineering and, eventually, a construction schedule. The Milwaukee Business Journal has reported that the Franklin land purchase is part of Costco’s broader strategy to bulk up warehouse capacity across southeast Wisconsin. City staff say they will post public hearing dates and permit filings in the coming weeks as applications are submitted and the project moves from paper to concrete.
