COLUMBUS, Ind. — Plans from King’s Hawaiian to build a large-scale food and beverage production facility near Edinburgh are moving forward.
The Bartholomew County Board of Zoning Appeals voted Monday approve the applicant’s request for a conditional use variance to allow the facility to be built in the Wellfield Protection Overlay District and their request for a building height variance.
However, they chose to continue the request for a variance regarding the size of wall signs, which was recommended by planning staff and requested by the applicant.
The subject property is located at 11900 N. County Road 200W in German Township, just east of Indiana Premium Outlets in Edinburgh.
According to the planning department’s staff report, the applicant is proposing to build a 532,000 square foot food and beverage production facility on the approximately 88-acre site. This includes a 368,000 square foot manufacturing facility with an attached 78,000 square foot cold storage building and a separate 86,000 square foot beverage plant, planning staff wrote.
A letter of intent from Foresite Group LLC, an engineering, planning, design and consulting firm, said the facility will be named “Project Whiteboard” and produce “bakery products and beverages.”
“The development is intended to be completed in stages with stage one as the main production facility, an approximate 368,000-square-foot plant, along with access, parking, landscaping, and utility infrastructure,” the firm wrote. “The overall site plan includes considerations for future phases to construct an adjoining cold storage facility for distribution and a potential free standing secondary plant.”
Joe Leonardo, SVP, Chief Operations Officer at King’s Hawaiian, said in a previous interview that the initial plant will be King’s Hawaiian. He added that they’ve acquired enough land to do other things with the site as well — such as expanding the footprint of King’s Hawaiian or bringing another brand to the area — but these are just possibilities rather than concrete plans.
