Drink Pump Maker Shurflo Expanding in Cypress
By CHRIS CZIBORR
Shurflo Pump Manufacturing Co., a Santa Ana maker of beverage pumps and other equipment, plans to expand into 231,670 square feet of new office, production and distribution space in Cypress by March.
The move will increase Shurflo’s space from its current 135,000 square feet in three buildings in Santa Ana, according to Jack Hosier, Shurflo’s vice president of operations.
The company, a unit of Milwaukee-based Wisconsin Energy Corp., is moving into a recently completed three-building campus at 5900 Katella Ave. in the Warland Business Center. The lease is valued at $25 million.
“We’ve outgrown the facility we are in,” Hosier said. “With business opportunities we have now and into the future, we felt it was time to add the additional space.”
Shurflo, which employs 400 people in OC, doesn’t plan any new hiring in the next year, Hosier said. Instead, the company plans to use the added space for production. Shurflo makes beverage pumps, water filters and other products used by restaurants and soft drink makers.
“We’re moving from being a component manufacturer to a systems manufacturer,” Hosier said. “So the end product is much larger and requires much more space for both manufacturing and storage.”
Shurflo supplies products to Coca-Cola Co. and HJ Heinz Co. Customers also include fast food chains such as Carl’s Jr., owned by Anaheim-based CKE Restaurants Inc., and the Arby’s chain, owned by Chicago-based Lunan Corp.
Restaurants are driving demand for more efficient beverage and condiment dispensing gear that is more sanitary and environmentally sound, according to Hosier.
“Open condiment containers used in stadiums could be contaminated by anyone,” he said.
Within five years, Shurflo expects half of its sales to come from newly developed products, Hosier said.
A major competitor is Lake Forest-based Flojet Corp., a unit of White Plains, N.Y.-based ITT Industries Inc. “We also have competing products coming in from Europe and Asia,” Hosier said.
Mitch Zehner and Louis Tomaselli of Voit Commercial in Anaheim represented Shurflo in the Cypress lease. Todd Taugner, David Prior and Murray Smith of Los Angeles-based The Klabin Co. represented property owner Warland Investments Co.
