Dreyer's opens one of world's largest ice cream plants

Laurel, Md., is now home to one of the world's largest ice cream plants. On October 19, Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream Holdings Inc. celebrated the completion of a $210 million expansion of its Laurel Operations Center (LOC), the largest of six ice cream manufacturing facilities operated by the company across the country.

LOC will now make and distribute more than 120 different Dreyer's, Edy's, Haagen-Dazs, Nestle and Skinny Cow ice cream products and frozen snacks.

Dreyer's has recently hired an additional 450 employees – mostly ice cream makers, and shipping and maintenance personnel – to staff the new 705,000-square-foot facility. More than 725 employees now work at the Laurel plant and the company announced today it plans to add another 240 employees over the next two years, creating a total of nearly 700 new jobs with the expansion.

The plant has grown more than six-fold in size and boasts the square footage of more than 14 football fields. In addition to adding five new ice cream manufacturing lines to its previous six, Dreyer's has added the capacity for nine future lines. It also has built a 200,000-square-foot, minus-20-degree Fahrenheit ice cream curing facility, and 23-door distribution center. The five-story curing facility finishes off and temporarily houses freshly made ice cream before it is loaded onto freezer trucks and shipped to grocery stores, convenience stores, drug stores, and restaurants across the country. Dreyer's expects LOC to produce nearly 58 million gallons of packaged ice cream and 370 million dozens of frozen snacks a year.

"The Laurel area of Howard County, Md., is now home to one of the largest ice cream plants, not just in the country, but in the world," said T. Gary Rogers, Dreyer's chairman and CEO. "More of America's favorite ice creams and frozen snacks will be made here than anywhere else. Recognizing and celebrating good work is part of our Dreyer's culture. We call it giving 'hoopla.' We extend a hearty round of hoopla to Howard County and the State of Maryland for helping us make this facility a reality. Ice cream has long been known to bring smiles to peoples' faces. Today in the Laurel area, it is also creating jobs and opportunities.”

Two years ago, the company celebrated the completion of a $100 million plant expansion in Bakersfield, California, which at that time, made the Bakersfield plant the largest in the Dreyer's network.