Henry Avocado Corp. of Escondido, CA., has moved about 7 miles across town to a spacious west side location after being on the east side of town for 94 years.
The two-story, 50,000-square-foot headquarters facility includes a packinghouse and distribution center. It is located in an industrial center and is close to two major thoroughfares — the Interstate 15 Freeway, which runs north and south, and State Route 78, which runs east and west.
The new building is 20 percent larger than the previous facility and has the latest processing, refrigeration and forced-air ripening elements in the industry.
The move allows the consolidation the administrative and processing machinery and personnel, all of which were in several buildings at the old location.
It includes 6,000 square feet of office space, 20 forced-air ripening rooms and 5 loading docks.
The facility also has a modern cold storage facility and a large yard for tractor trailers.
The move started in late summer and was just completed.
The company continues to operate a second 29,000-square-foot cold storage facility in Escondido.
Henry Avocado can ship 2 million cartons of avocados from the 2 facilities annually.
The original Escondido facility will be demolished to make room for a housing development, but the firm will continue to farm in the upper elevations.
The company, a year-round avocado grower-shipper, operates seven Primus Labs-certified distribution centers throughout the U.S. with a total of 100 ripening rooms.