Carvel gets state support.

Carvel's Celebration Foods subsidiary is slated to get a grant and a loan from the state of Connecticut valued at $2.6 million. The money is to help buy machinery and other equipment for the 120,000-square-foot facility under construction in New Britain.

State Senator Donald J. DeFronzo (D-New Britain) welcomed news that funds supporting the new Carvel operation in New Britain have been placed on the agenda for the State Bond Commission's next meeting. "I'm glad to see these allocations for Carve! on the Bond Commission agenda," said Senator DeFronzo. "The company is making an investment in the City of New Britain, and I'm pleased to see the state making an investment of its own. The new Carrel facility is expected to bring more than 200 jobs into our city and to significantly add to the state economy and will make use of a remediated brownfield site. It's this kind of smart development that will help to encourage strong growth in New Britain."

The funding for the ice cream and frozen dessert company offers $1.3 million in loan forgiveness if it creates 225 full-time jobs and retains 40 existing jobs within the first three years. The facility will house administrative offices, food production space, and deep-frozen storage facilities. The proposal is expected to add an estimated $500,000 in real and personal property taxes to the city and an estimated $23 million economic return to the state over the next 10 years.

Carvel announced plans for the New Britain Celebration Foods facility in June 2007. The plant manufactures the prepared Carvel brand ice cream cakes sold in supermarkets, groceries, and other outlets. The new space will allow Celebration Foods, now based at Carrel headquarters in Rocky Hill, CT, to expand its product line to non-ice cream cake products such as cheese cakes.

As noted in the June 2007 Ice Cream Reporter, Celebration Foods currently has manufacturing facilities in Massachusetts, Maryland and California. It will move its 40 employees from Rocky Hill to the New Britain site when the facility opens in March 2008.

Carvel reports that several states were interested in hosting the new plant, but the state of Connecticut and the city of New Britain made a major effort to keep production in the state, which is reported to be providing a $2.6 million low-interest loan for the Celebration Foods project, up to $2 million in Urban and Industrial Sites Reinvestment Tax Credits,