No Meat Factory closed on a deal in February to purchase the Twin City Foods facility for $19.4 million in order to expand their alternative meat business, Sarah Cho announced to the Stanwood City Council on Thursday.
Cho is the city’s economic development and marketing manager who has been helping facilitate communication and meetings between company officials, city staff and others.
Leon Bell and Dieter Thiem co-founded No Meat Factory in 2019 in British Columbia. It recently attracted $42 million from investors to back plans to expand their alternative meat company into the U.S., according to trade industry news.
No Meat Factory manufactures vegan products with meat-like texture. Their ingredients include soy, wheat, pea, oat, pulses, pumpkin, fava bean, chickpea, mung bean and rice.
The company's leaders have been looking at several locations suit their purposes.
“It looks like they were very happy with what Stanwood had to offer,” Cho said.
The founders' main goal was to find a place to expand operations. They only had 30,000 square feet, while the Twin City Foods building has around 200,000, which would allow them to grow, Cho said. They discussed their needs for water and wastewater treatment with city staff.
No Meat Factory considered Stanwood and Snohomish County location as ideal because it produces a lot of the produce they would be using, she said.
The city has been working closely with the owners since September. The business is expected to bring in as many as 200 jobs to Stanwood, Cho said.
The facility is located at 10120 269th Place, near the busy intersection where Old Pacific Highway (102nd Avenue NW) meets Highway 532. It’s an iconic big white building across the highway from City Hall.
“Directors and managers did have a discussion of how traffic would be impacted with their trucks coming and leaving,” Cho said. “Once they get into full operation and determine how many employees will be at what shift at what time of the day, I think that will help city and staff determine what accommodations we need to have or address for traffic issues.”
Contact reporter Izzie Lund at ilund@scnews.com and follow her on Twitter @IzzieLund for updates throughout the week.
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