State and company officials confirmed Thursday that grocery distributor McLane Co. Inc. plans to build a Jessup facility, spending $60 million and hiring up to 500 people by 2009.
The project was first reported by The Times-Tribune in January, but new details were provided at an official announcement Thursday.
Site work for the 400,000-square-foot distribution center in the Valley View Business Park has begun, and the facility is scheduled to open next spring with 200 employees.
By the end of 2008, employment will swell to between 400 and 500, McLane Grocery Division President Mike Youngblood said at a Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce office event attended by Gov. Ed Rendell.
Mr. Youngblood declined to disclose salaries, saying they haven’t been determined. However, he said McLane, based in Carrollton, Texas, sets wages to be in the top 25 percent range of competing facilities.
“We try to be high in the market, otherwise we can’t get the top team members we need,” he said.
The company looked at dozens of sites between Harrisburg and the Poconos. Mr. Youngblood said a $500,000 state grant for worker training and equipment helped it select Jessup.
McLane purchased 60 acres of land for $3.84 million from the Scranton Lackawanna Industrial Building Co., the development arm of the chamber and owner of the Valley View Business Park.
The distribution center, McLane Grocery’s 20th in the nation, will help better serve the growing market in the East and take pressure off existing McLane facilities in Syracuse, N.Y., Frederick, Md., and Lexington, Ky.
The grocery distribution company serves mostly convenience stores and is by far the leader in the highly fractured market, with sales exceeding those of its next 10 closest competitors combined. The company also serves drug stores, Target stores and its former corporate parent, Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
The company has been part of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., a holding company headed by legendary investor Warren Buffett, since 2003.
Despite its size and lineage, the company is rather unknown to the general public, and that suits McLane officials just fine.
“We offer results without talk,” Mr. Youngblood said. “We may be under the radar, but we are stable, strong, U.S.-based, and we have grown steadily and smartly every year since 1894.”
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