by Melissa Wells

Bill Geers, CSR Rinker Materials rebar manager, chose Plant City over Orlando. Photo by Alex McKnight

At the turn of this century, Plant City was a transportation focal point for west and central Florida. Now, 100 years later, thanks to the expansion of Interstate 4, the eastern Hillsborough County town again finds itself in that enviable position.

"Plant City is being seen as a hub in a larger-spoked wheel for the entire west central Florida area," says Mayor Randy Larson, who in his private life is an engineer with Post Buckley Schuh and Jernigan. "It's much like it was 100 years ago, when Plant City's founding was based on having the only north-south and east-west railroad."

Add an infrastructure of water and sewer with 50-percent excess capacity to the roads and available land in a central location and you have a veritable promised land for real estate visionaries, proclaims the mayor.

"No other place in Hillsborough County can claim that type of capacity," Larson says. "This makes Plant City a very rare find for new development, whether commercial, industrial or the Silicon Valley type of project."

So why aren't there more large developments occurring in Plant City? "The land isn't cheap there any more," says the mayor. "Development goes to where it's easiest to develop and when property values go up because of prime location, it's easier to build a warehouse somewhere else." With his tongue planted firmly in his cheek, he adds, grandly, "Plant City has become a Fifth Avenue location."

It may be too grand for warehouses, but this town has been pouring on the Southern charm for the decision makers at the International Softball Federation. Currently based in Oklahoma City, the federation is looking for a new home and Plant City is on its short list of four (Cathedral City, Calif., Dallas and Oklahoma City are the competition). The 6,700-seat Plant City Stadium, once the spring training facility for the National League Cincinnati Reds, appears to be a perfect match for the international federation, which has 100 member nations. The organization's site selection has made its visits and a final decision is due in mid-January, says federation president Don Porter.

"This is a big, big deal for Plant City," says Larson. "I'm very optimistic. We have a facility that, by their admission, no other community has been able to offer. Our stadium can seat more people than the Olympic stadium that was built in Columbus (Georgia). It's exactly the type of facility they want."

The impact on Plant City would be more than economic. There is a cultural diversity inherent in 100 nations participating in local training activities and games. And the International Softball Federation sits on the Olympics Committee.

"This takes on a whole new perspective," Larson says. "If the federation picks Plant City, it's also a win for the region." The mayor thinks a win for his town would put "the Tampa Bay and Orlando bid for the 2012 Olympics much closer to a reality. The softball stadium would already be there."

And while city fathers have been pitching softball, an investor has on his own discovered the charm of the place. Alan Mengel, president of Capital Resource Group in Naples, recently purchased the dark Plant City Steel facility at U.S. Highway 92 and Park Road and renamed it Plant City Commercial Campus. His first and only tenant to date is CSR Rinker Materials, a subsidiary of Australia-based Colonial Sugar Refiners. CSR Rinker produces rebar for the construction industry in the 56,000-square-foot open-air industrial center.

"This is a great place to manufacture and distribute from," says Mengel. "I'm tagging onto what other people have figured out, that Plant City is a dynamite place to do business."

Mengel is considering acquiring additional land in town.

CSR Rinker chose Plant City for its rebar fabrication plant because it made good economic sense. "I was hired to expand our plant in Orlando, but the expense to develop in Orlando was cost-prohibitive," says Bill Geers, CSR Rinker's rebar manager. "Plant City is an excellent distribution center with access to the east coast, Orlando and the Tampa Bay area. It's the best of all worlds. We have rail access here and this is making good use of an existing facility."

The company, operating since May, is confident that it will expand into even more space. "It doesn't look like much on the outside," Geers says, "but on the inside it's a lean, mean rebar-producing machine."

Across the street International Paper has just celebrated the opening of its newly expanded quarters. The producer of paper beverage cartons for the juice industry built its original 148,000-square-foot building in 1992 and opened with 125 employees. With the expansion, the facility will have 300,000 square feet, and there are 200 employees.

This dynamic growth can be attributed to the increased demand for fresh citrus beverages, helped along by the little cap on the quart containers that makes pouring the juice an easy task. "Consumption of fresh orange juice has escalated as opposed to frozen orange juice," says Kerry Temoin, plant manager at International Paper.

The logic of building in Plant City was really a no-brainer. "We're within a 100-mile radius of 70 percent of the juice processing that's being done," Temoin says. "Three of these major beverage customers Ð Tropicana, Lykes Pasco and Citrus World Hesco Ð are within an hour's drive of this facility."

Another firm, Alumax Extrusions Inc., which has operated in the Plant City Industrial Park for the past couple years, has recently been acquired by Alcoa. "The world's largest producer of aluminum extrusions has bought the third largest," says C.W. Davis, plant manager at Alcoa. "The headquarters for extruded products will be in Plant City."

Davis expects no changes in the Plant City operation.

At the easternmost edge of town, developer Bill Loftin has started construction of a 156,000-square-foot speculative warehouse at the Plant City Commerce Center. It should come online next summer, and Loftin isn't worried about economic conditions. "Our demands and absorption rates haven't wavered this year," Loftin says. "If anything, it's been better."

Walden Woods Business Center has become the corporate address of AutoNation's 100,000-square-foot detailing and auto repair facility as well as the corrugated box manufacturing division of Willamette Industries.

The newest addition to the center is International Food Group, a supplier of foods to restaurants such as Wendy's, Pizza Hut and KFC. The firm is occupying 55,000 square feet in a 121,500-square-foot warehouse built by EastGroup Inc. The move gives the company twice as much room as it previously occupied in Tampa.

"The reasons we chose this Plant City location are, first, the building itself. It's a very nice facility and has been constructed to meet our needs," says Berry Wright, vice president and general manager at International Food Group. "Second, we get freight efficiencies. I buy product in the U.S. and ship it out in containers through different ports to 120 different countries."

The five-year-old company has annual sales of approximately $25 million in foreign revenue. "We don't do anything domestically," Wright says. "We're an exporter."

Walden Woods gained another new tenant recently when Tru-Green ChemLawn occupied a 12,000-square-foot building at the center.

Nancy Phaneuf of EastGroup is enthusiastic about both the business center and the town. "Plant City is the next place," she says. "The community is supportive of new business. There's a lot of land available at Walden Woods, 600 to 700 acres. This is a place to keep your eye on. Land isn't in Tampa; it's just not there."

Ed Miller at Colliers Arnold agrees. "The I-75 corridor has come into its own for business-oriented development and it's pushing development of industrial and distribution space eastward from Brandon," he says. "Plant City is a great intermodal center for distribution by truck, plane and rail. Utilities are in place and locations are available."

As if on cue, the Hillsborough Aviation Authority is upgrading facilities at the Plant City Airport, which is used primarily for corporate and private flights. Construction should begin in mid-1999 on a new airport terminal building.

"We'll be adding 750 feet of pavement to make the runway 3,950 feet long," says Ed Cooley, director of general aviation at the Hillsborough Aviation Authority. "A portion of the runway was cut off due to a sinkhole. We'll bridge the sinkhole and re-establish the runway."

Downtown, a significant revitalization is taking place. David Hawthorne, a local boy who made good, has spearheaded the initiative by purchasing and renovating 10 buildings in the historic district. These buildings, totaling about 100,000 square feet, now house a bevy of antique shops and artists' lofts, and of the 40,000 square feet converted to office space, about 80 percent is leased.

"My vision is for downtown Plant City to become a destination of the antique shopper on the road to Mount Dora," says Hawthorne, who specializes in turning around financially troubled corporations. "Our next addition to the historic district is a high-end French antiques shop. That will be available in late spring 1999."

Sculptors, painters and photographers comprise the small arts community that is assembling downtown. A Hawthorne favorite is John Briggs, who has set up his studio on Collins Street. "Briggs is one of the foremost realist artists in America," Hawthorne says. "He has done work for Disney, teaching figure drawing to animators."

Hawthorne made his fortune away from his home town but chose to return because he couldn't resist Plant City. "There's no crime here," he says. "It's as charming a place as I've lived and I can live anywhere I want. It's what Disney Celebration is trying to be. It's already here in Plant City. It never left to begin with."

While Hawthorne has no immediate plans to renovate more downtown buildings, Ed Verner, owner of City Properties Company, will. Verner bought and renovated the Lee building, a 19,000-square-foot yellow brick structure built in 1922. All available space as been leased except for four full-service executive suites on the upper level. Now Verner has bought another five buildings with a similar purpose in mind.

"I personally enjoy doing this," Verner says. "I got sick of looking at some of those eyesores. I saw a real opportunity in these white elephants." City government assisted the revitalization by building McCall Park, a two-block strip that includes a town square with a gazebo and green areas.

"We decided we'd be a partner with the private sector," says Mayor Larson. "This is a wholesome community. In the last two years there has been close to 200,000 square feet of new church buildings in Plant City. What a statistic to brag about! That shows the family values of our community and it's across the denominations. It's refreshing and fun to be part of a community like this."

As to the cleanup that's going on downtown, "it's good to get rid of the baggage," Larson says. "Six years ago our downtown was dead. We provided incentives for private money to invest in downtown. And we did the park with public money to show interest on the government's part to preserve what the private investors are doing. It has all worked."

As to the office space Verner is developing in downtown, 90 percent is occupied. The 10 percent unoccupied is due to renovations being made on the historic buildings, he says. The spirit of something special is in the air and interest in being part of that is coming from as far away as Winter Haven, Lakeland and Tampa.

"We have a lot of companies from outside Plant City that are inquiring and coming into downtown," says Philip Balliet, property manager at City Properties Company. "The interest is due to the improvements. Three years ago everyone was going south of town into strip centers. Now everyone wants to come back downtown. We have more evening and weekend activity and that's exciting for us."

Balliet adds that rents have increased accordingly, going up to 12 dollars a square foot from $6 or $7 prior to the renovations. "We can still undercut the price of strip mall space," Verner says. "Our pricing is good because downtown was so undervalued. We're seeing a renaissance of small specialty retailers."

Another factor motivating Verner is the cooperation of various agencies in the effort. "The chamber of commerce, city government and historical societies have united," he says. "These groups used to have battle lines drawn. Now people are energetic and creative and have suspended their disbelief."

No story on Plant City would be complete without a reference to the Strawberry Festival, which draws 800,000 visitors. Performers at the upcoming festival from February 25 through March 7 include Loretta Lynn, the Beach Boys, Billy Ray Cyrus, Ben Vereen, Wayne Newton and Vince Gill.

"We draw just about as many people to the Strawberry Festival as go to the Florida State Fair," says city manager Phil Waldron.

And even though Waldron claims Plant City is the fastest-growing area in Hillsborough County, he believes it will always keep its Southern charm. "That's because this city has been around 113 years," he says. "People in this area are descendants of the founders and that cohesiveness is still here. Everybody is related in some way to one another. The old ties are here and the roots go a long way back."