GREELEY, Colo.—The cheese manufacturing plant that Denver-based Leprino Foods plans to build in Greeley is expected to eventually create 500 jobs.
The plant would employ 260 people at its inception, with 500 total new jobs when all construction is complete in later building phases, the Greeley Tribune reported. Construction is expected to be complete by 2012.
City officials and Leprino Foods signed a development agreement Friday for the plant. The company also had considered Garden City, Kan., for the plant.
“This is a major domino falling in the redevelopment of east Greeley,” Greeley City Manager Roy Otto said Friday.
Over 20 years, officials hope Greeley, Weld County and Colorado will reap more than $15 billion in economic benefits from the plant, the Greeley Tribune reported.
Leprino officials said they chose to use the old Western Sugar Cooperative site in east Greeley partly because of the quality and availability of milk in Weld County, the state’s largest producer of dairy products.
Mike Reidy, senior vice president for Leprino, said the company followed the recommendation of the Dairy Farmers of America in choosing Greeley because of the potential for dairy farm growth in northern Colorado.
Reidy said the plant will use roughly 7 million pounds per day of milk.
Les Hardesty, chairman of the Mountain Area of the Dairy Farmers of America, said family dairies in northern Colorado can provide most all of the milk Leprino needs, but it’s possible that the dairy industry there would have to grow.
Leprino’s $143 million, 847,000 square-foot plant will convert milk into cheese, primarily for pizza makers. Leprino also expects to spend $122 million on equipment; the site cost more than $5 million.
To lure the plant, Greeley officials offered incentives such as tax breaks and discounted water from the city’s water bank.
