"If
people look at the plant there is a dramatic difference between how
it looked last year and how it looks now," said Joe Waryold, plant
manager at the Maxwell House facility. "And a year from now it will
look even better," Waryold said. The Jacksonville plant grinds,
roasts and packages coffee.
"We have done quite a bit of exterior upgrade work to make sure
we are a perfect fit with the surroundings," Waryold said. "As the
area upgrades, we want to be ready for the Super Bowl like everybody
else," Waryold said.
While the bulk of the company's attention is on the renovation
work, company officials have other plans brewing for a coffee shop.
"It is a future idea consideration, and it would fit in with what
is going on downtown," Waryold said.
He said there is no specific timetable for building a coffee.
City officials are pleased with the company's renovation work and
the coffee shop idea.
"A museum or coffee shop in an area that is a corridor from
downtown to the stadium would be a perfect presentation of what
[Maxwell House] do," said Mike Weinstein, president and CEO of the
Jacksonville Super Bowl Host Committee.
In most cities, developers would be hard-pressed to build upscale
residential and commercial developments across the street from a
coffee plant and a sheriff's office headquarters and jail. Along Bay
Street in Jacksonville, that is the scenario.
"If you don't understand Jacksonville, you would think that it
would be an impediment for growth," said Weinstein, who played a key
role in several redevelopment projects on the Northbank. He was the
executive director of the Jacksonville Economic Development
Commission before taking the Super Bowl leadership post. "We are a
working-class community that understands all of the elements that
make up a community, and we don't have to hide from our businesses
or make them hide."
The Maxwell House plant, which is the largest of the company's
plants, has had a long and storied past in Jacksonville.
The plant is located in an area that was a hub for the shipping
industry, which was a reason company officials chose the site.
"This site was close to where coffee used to be loaded onto ships
on Bay Street and it just has stayed here," Waryold said.
Maxwell House is a wholly owned subsidiary of Kraft Foods Inc.
Inc. in Northfield, Ill., a suburb of Chicago.
In 1990, General Foods, the parent company of Maxwell House at
the time, considered closing the Jacksonville plant or one in
Hoboken, N.J.
Local and state officials spooned over $4.8 million in tax
incentives and other perks to entice company officials to choose
Jacksonville over Hoboken.
Also, local business owners and city officials launched a
hard-fought and ultimately successful "Keep Max in Jax" campaign to
keep the company in Jacksonville.
General Foods, chose Jacksonville over Hoboken to consolidate the
company's East Coast operations.
The company spent $35 million to expand the plant to accommodate
increased production from the closed plant. In 1993, the plant
underwent a $25 million expansion project to handle mixing and
packaging operations performed at a closed General Foods
International Coffees plant in Evansville, Ind.
Public money won't be used for the latest rounds of renovations
at the plant. And the changes are not being done to absorb more
production.
Instead, the improvements are all aesthetics and the company will
foot its own bill.
"It is something that has been our idea and our money and
something that we saw for the vision of downtown," Waryold said.
Maxwell House's renovation is the result of the public and
private investment that is taking place in downtown Jacksonville,
said Terry Lorince, executive director of Downtown Vision Inc., a
organization that markets and provides ambassador services in
downtown Jacksonville.
"We are one of the few cities in the United States to smell like
fresh-brewed coffee in the morning and at 5:30 p.m.," Lorince said.
Business writer Earl Daniels can be reached at (904)
359-4689 or via e-mail at edaniels.
