ConAgra to expand Waterloo facility

ConAgra Foods is planning a $50 million, 99,000-square-foot expansion at its Waterloo facility, city officials announced Wednesday.

The plant, located in the Waterloo MidPort Industrial Park, makes snacks marketed under the Snack Pack and Swiss Miss brand names.

The expansion will increase production by 30 percent, allowing the facility to add DAVID snack seed production to its line, the city said in a statement.

The expansion will add up to 55 positions, city officials estimated.

'It does so many things for us,” said Mayor Buck Clark. 'It adds jobs and adds tax base, and it'll put people to work in the construction process.

'But what it really does is amplifies to death that Waterloo is doing very, very well.”

The proposed expansion project will add new processing, packaging, warehouse and administrative space. In addition, the new production line will create a highly automated, manufacturing platform designed to offer more flexibility in packaging options as business needs change, city officials said.

ConAgra has been in Waterloo since 1997. This most recent expansion project will be the facility's third.

ConAgra Foods officials have asked for state incentives with the Iowa Economic Development Authority as well as financial assistance from the city of Waterloo.

Pending incentives approval, the project is expected to break ground in mid-June and be complete by late 2016.

'We get chided quite a bit, you know, that we don't do anything right up here or we're giving away land.” the mayor said. 'If you listen to the naysayers, you'd think you'd have busloads of people leaving town every day. But that's just not the case.”

Sarah McCarthy of KCRG-TV9 contributed to this report.