MUSCATINE, Iowa – Grain Processing Corporation, part of the KENT Corporation family of companies headquartered here, is expanding its footprint with its acquisition of a former flour manufacturing and warehouse facility in Oskaloosa, Iowa.
GPC announced in a news release earlier this week that it had acquired the facility, which consists of a 64,000-square-foot production and seed cleaning facility. Located in southeast Iowa, the facility sits on 35 acres allowing for ample future growth.
Company spokeswoman Carol Reynolds, KENT’s vice president of human resources and communications, told the QCBJ in an email that the facility became available when its former owner, World Food Processing, closed the plant in June. Financial details of the purchase were not disclosed.
The transaction was a facility-only purchase by GPC, which will rebrand it under the GPC name, she added. “Plans for this facility are still being considered by GPC. Initial use of the site will be an extension of the Grinnell (Iowa) GPC location, primarily for warehousing or other needs.”
The Oskaloosa facility was originally built in 2000 by World Food Processing.
In its release, GPC said the site allows for ample future growth and product offering diversification, along with strategic vertical integration within other nearby KENT businesses.
GPC’s primary products include high-purity alcohols, corn starches, maltodextrins and corn syrup solids. Its customers use GPC ingredients for beverage alcohol, food products, nutraceuticals, pharmaceuticals, personal care and industrial starch applications.
The company also said the new acquisition will build upon the success of its soy and chickpea milling operations in Grinnell.
In July 2022, GPC completed its purchase of the Grinnell-based Natural Products, Inc., a leading manufacturer of full-fat soy ingredients made from non-GMO or Certified Organic soybeans. In addition to soybeans, NPI processes other pulses such as chickpeas, which provide nutritional and functional improvements to many categories.
GPC said the Oskaloosa acquisition also further deepens its longstanding history of offering innovative, high-quality, plant-based ingredients that consumers worldwide desire.
“As we pursue our vision to continue expanding to meet the desires and dietary requirements of a consistently growing world population, I am excited to be adding this facility to our footprint,” GPC President Jimmy Kent said in the release. “We will better leverage our soy and chickpea flour production capabilities while expanding our value-added milling business further.”
GPC is a wholly owned subsidiary of Kent Corporation, also headquartered in Muscatine, that now has a third generation of the Kent family in leadership positions in the company’s management. Affiliated companies include Kent Nutrition Group, Kent Pet Group and Kent Precision Foods Group.
KENT serves customers across the world and employs approximately 2,000 people in 40 locations across 20 states and seven countries.
The news comes just two weeks after Kent Corp. celebrated the grand opening of the Iowa State University Kent Feed Mill and Grain Science Complex in Ames. The grain storage and feed million complex is located on 10 acres of university farmland and can produce up to 30,000 tons of feed and store more than 200,000 bushels of grain.
The complex also includes an education building with an analytical laboratory, pilot plant, a 100-foot-tall concrete milling tower and a 40-foot-tall pelleting plant.
With financial support from the feed and grain industries, ISU and equipment manufacturers, Kent Corp. gave the lead $8 million gift to bring the project to reality.
