HOUSTON — Coca-Cola Southwest Beverages (CCSWB), a Dallas-based subsidiary of Mexican Coca-Cola bottler Arca Continental, is breaking ground today on its new $250 million production and distribution facility in Houston. The new facility will be the first new Coca-Cola plant built in the United States in a decade.
Situated within Pinto Business Park, the 1 million-square-foot facility will include manufacturing with five new production lines, distribution, warehouse and sales. Pinto Business Park is a Hines-owned campus spanning 971 acres in northwest Houston.
“Coca-Cola has been a part of the greater Houston community for more than 100 years,” says Mark Schortman, president and CEO of CCSWB. “Since opening our first facility in 1902, consumer dynamics have changed and the population in the Houston metro area has increased tremendously. We need to expand and grow our production facility to invest in the future and provide our wide variety of beverages.”
In May, after a little over a year of becoming the first Latin American bottler to operate within the U.S. Coca-Cola network, Arca Continental announced the new facility, which is one of the largest current capital investments in Texas by a Mexican company.
The new Coca-Cola bottling plant will be situated within Pinto Business Park, a 971-acre industrial park in Houston owned by Hines.
“The projected investment for this facility reflects our long-term commitment with the values of our organization, such as customer-centric market service, operational excellence, social responsibility and sustainability,” says Francisco Garza Egloff, CEO of Arca Continental.
CCSWB has hired Jacksonville, Fla.-based Haskell to lead the project. Since the announcement in May, the project team has begun preparing the site for construction, installing soil erosion fences, siting utility power poles and creating entrance and exit access roads for heavy equipment.
CCSWB anticipates actual construction of the buildings to begin in the first quarter of 2019. The company plans to begin installing equipment in the second quarter and occupy space by the end of 2019. CCSWB plans for the facility to be up and running in the first quarter of 2020.
Arca Continental is the second largest Coca-Cola bottling company in
Latin America. Within its Coca-Cola franchise, the company serves a population of more than 119 million in the northern and western parts of Mexico, as well as Ecuador, Peru, the northern region of Argentina and the Southwestern U.S.
Coca-Cola Southwest Beverages is one of the largest Coca-Cola bottlers in the United States. CCSWB produces, markets and distributes Coca-Cola brands throughout Texas and parts of New Mexico, Oklahoma and Arkansas. The company employs more than 8,900 associates who operate 10 production plants and 40 distribution facilities, serving more than 31 million consumers.
— John Nelson