[Infographic] 5 Important Factors for Selecting a Site for Your New Food Plant

When choosing the ideal site for your new food plant, your decision should always tie back to a single question: How will this site help my business thrive? Build a sound business plan around the type and quantity of goods your facility will produce, and use that plan to guide you through your site selection. You’ll need to address several factors throughout your search, most of important of which are the five core factors illustrated in the infographic below:

Some factors may apply more than others to certain sites, but it’s important to take each into consideration for each site you are interested in. To round out your analysis, be sure to also consider the factors below:

• • Business environment—A welcoming business environment is just as important as topography in site selection. Choose a site with a surrounding community that will support expected business growth. Consider the following:
    • Taxes—Property, state and other taxes vary from location to location. Conduct comparative analyses to determine which locations offer the best tax benefits for your business.
    • Subsidies—States and municipalities continue to offer incentive packages to food and beverage companies looking to build new plants. Weigh those incentives against other factors mentioned in this article to determine if they’re worth it.
  • Labor costs and quality—Labor costs and quality are key to the success of a new plant. Be sure to examine both current and projected wages to understand how choosing that site will affect the cost of operations — now and in the future. Also determine the availability of skilled workers in the surrounding area; a brand new facility can’t be successful without qualified personnel to run it.

• Consider a retrofit— Building a new facility detracts a great deal of time and attention from current operations, which food processors may not be able to afford. There may also be pressure to have a new plant up and running in a short amount of time. In these cases, retrofitting or expanding an existing food plant could be your best option, because it’s generally less expensive and and can be completed more quickly than a greenfield project.

To learn more about the site-selection process, email me at foodforthought@stellar.net.