Frito-Lay once again is seeking economic incentives to build a long-awaited $180 million high-tech distribution center in Osceola County that has been under discussion for three years.
The Plano, Texas-based snack food subsidiary of PepsiCo Inc. (Nasdaq: PEP) on Aug. 9 will ask the Osceola County Commission for a property tax abatement incentive. If approved, Frito-Lay would get a 100% refund of the property taxes assessed by the county for tax years 2025-2029, and a 50% refund for tax years 2030-2034.
In return, the company would build a 355,000-square-foot “mega-fulfillment center” and add 180 full-time jobs at an average wage of at least $43,081, or 115% of Osceola County’s average annual wage. It would have to make the full capital investment for the construction and equipment by Dec. 31, 2025.
The proposed facility has grown in scale from when it was first proposed as a $130 million, 286,000-square-foot facility in mid-2018. At that time, the proposed project would have created 200 jobs. However, a few weeks later the company asked for a delay on its request for incentives, and in 2019, it announced that the facility’s construction was delayed for an unspecified amount of time. No explanation for the delay was given.
PepsiCo’s entity Quaker Sales & Distribution Inc. bought the 75-acre site in 2007 for $9.03 million, according to Osceola County property records. Those property rights were transferred to Frito-Lay in 2019.