The latest tasty morsel to fall into Garlic City is a
Salinas-based pasta company that expects to employ as many as 250
workers come next spring. Monterey Gourmet Foods, Inc., a maker of
prepared pasta meals, announced Wednesday it will move its Salinas
operation to Gilroy. The company has purchased a 120,000 square
foot industrial building located at 5755 Rossi Lane in southeast
Gilroy to accommodate its growing commercial food operations, said
Chief Financial Officer Scott Wheeler.
The latest tasty morsel to fall into Garlic City is a Salinas-based pasta company that expects to employ as many as 250 workers come next spring.
Monterey Gourmet Foods, Inc., a maker of prepared pasta meals, announced Wednesday it will move its Salinas operation to Gilroy. The company has purchased a 120,000 square foot industrial building located at 5755 Rossi Lane in southeast Gilroy to accommodate its growing commercial food operations, said Chief Financial Officer Scott Wheeler.
Though the company expects many of its workers from the Salinas plant, which employs about 200 people, to work at the Gilroy plant, Wheeler said the new plant will create construction jobs and will need additional plant employees.
The company’s move will not only bring jobs to Gilroy, it will bring new revenue, said Richard Spitler, president and chief executive officer of the Gilroy Economic Development Corporation.
“What I like is that it’s creating jobs in town,” he said. “And they’re not just recycling existing dollars but they’re bringing outside dollars into the community. What I really like to see is manufacturing and assembly jobs because they tend to increase the economic base in town.”
Several businesses such as San Jose-based Silva Sausage, North Coast Medical and Angelica Linen have recently moved or plan to move operations to Gilroy, and Spitler said he’s not surprised. With those companies and the arrival of Monterey Gourmet Foods comes a total of about 800 jobs, he pointed out.
The future Monterey Gourmet Foods facility – currently home to the California Door Corporation, Ferguson Enterprises and Performance Art – will require at least $10 million in equipment and other improvements, Wheeler said. The pasta company hopes to have its Gilroy facility up and running by March.
The company is a subsidiary of Korea-based Pulmuone Holdings Co., Ltd., a market leader in the fresh and health foods category with annual sales of approximately $1 billion. Mark Sanchez, senior vice president of Colliers International in Gilroy, confirmed the transaction had taken place and that the company had closed escrow.
As its Salinas plant began running out of capacity, the pasta company started looking around in the area for a new facility, Wheeler said. They came across the Rossi Lane property, which met their requirements, and entered into talks with city officials, who were very helpful in facilitating the purchase, Wheeler said.
“It all just started to make sense,” he said. “We didn’t want to develop a whole new building and when we came across the one in Gilroy, and found that it met our requirements, everything started to materialize.”
Sanchez, who manages properties from South Santa Clara County to San Benito and Monterey counties, said that, after a lull in recent years, Gilroy’s warehouses are starting to fill up again. Additionally, Gilroy has the land that many cities to the north are lacking, which gives it potential for future development, Sanchez said.
“We’re fairly full,” he said. “The vacancy rate is dropping right now. I don’t know if we can accommodate anyone who needs more than 50,000 square feet under one roof.”
The pasta company’s decision to move, which comes on the heels of Gilroy’s famous Garlic Festival, only reinforces what residents have known about the garlic capital for decades, Spitler said.
“They were really impressed with the fact that Gilroy is all about high quality food,” he said. “We’re building a momentum here.”
