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A company that is planning to make New Mexico one of its first locations for a chain of specialized refrigerated warehouses has been awarded economic assistance from the New Mexico Local Economic Development Act (LEDA) job-creation fund, the New Mexico Economic Development Department (NMEDD) announced Jan. 12.
Artico Cold Management was formed in 2021 and is planning several projects across the United States, with plans to expand into Mexico and Latin America, NMEDD said. It specializes in the management of temperature-controlled warehouses to help agricultural producers, food manufacturers, distributors and retailers fortify the supply chain.
Artico Cold New Mexico LLC has been awarded $600,000 in LEDA funds to help with its $30 million, 120,000-square-foot, cold storage facility at the Las Cruces Innovation and Industrial Park (LCIIP), the news release said. The project will take 12 to 18 months to complete with an expected opening in September 2023. The company has pledged to hire up to 60 employees.
The City of Las Cruces is also pledging $281,400 in economic assistance to the company.
The company chose southern New Mexico and Las Cruces because of its robust agricultural economy, proximity to Mexico and the international border, and the state's business climate, including the workforce and incentives, NMEDD said.
“Cold storage is in short supply across the United States, and we see the need in New Mexico for more capacity,” Artico CEO Richard Taveras said. “There are significant opportunities to help producers of chiles, dairy, pecans, meats, vegetables. This is an attractive opportunity, and the LEDA investment is critical – the state and city support gets this moving and helps us get over the finish line.”
“We are very fortunate to have Artico locating at LCIIP, and this will be the first new business with construction activity out there since 2017,” Las Cruces City Manager Ifo Pili said.
“A lot of time and effort has been put in by the city’s Economic Development Department and our partners to get here, and we’ll soon see that this is the start of something big for the industrial park. We could not ask for a better business to take that first step with us because of the amount of investment and amazing job opportunities they will be creating for Las Cruces,” Pili said.
In addition to state and city support, $100,000 from the El Paso Electric New Mexico Economic Development fund has been pledged to support the project. The fund, which is administered by the Mesilla Valley Economic Development Alliance (MVEDA) and the Community Foundation of Southern New Mexico, was established by El Paso Electric in connection with the corporate sale of the utility to Infrastructure Investments Fund.
MVEDA and the City of Las Cruces worked to recruit the company to Las Cruces, NMEDD said.
“Artico is not only making a significant capital investment in new facilities in LCIIP, but the operation itself will also serve as supporting infrastructure to our rich agricultural region and will also assist in attracting future value-added agricultural interests,” MVEDA President and CEO Davin Lopez said.
