Meat Plants, Bakeries Among Recent Projects

While distribution center projects are plentiful, there are still plenty of food factory projects simmering in the U.S.
        Pioneer Frozen Foods is spending $32 million to renovate a former hosiery mill in Prosperity, S.C., to produce a line of frozen dough and baked products for service customers. Pioneer, a division of C.H. Guenther & Son, will create about 145 jobs.
        Russer Foods, a division of Tyson Foods, is expanding its facility in Buffalo, N.Y., and will create 200 jobs to produce deli meats.

Robert F. Zane

        Pepperidge Farm, a subsidiary of Campbell Soup Co., is building a $72 million, 265,000-sq.-ft. (24,619-sq.-m.) bakery in Bloomfield, Conn., just north of Hartford. The new facility will produce breads, rolls and stuffing to meet the growing demand for Pepperidge Farm fresh baked goods in the Northeast. With a target opening date of Fall 2003, the facility will replace a 54-year-old bakery. Pepperidge Farm awarded the construction management contract to Suitt Construction Co.
        Robert F. Zane, group director of real estate for Campbell, says the Bloomfield site fit the qualifications of a matrix that considered labor, utilities, transportation and demographics. Zane, vice chairman of the new Industrial Asset Management Council (IAMC), says the site-selection process took nearly five months.
        "We've been in Connecticut a long time," Zane says. "We did a five-state review and worked with economic development groups in each of the states we considered."