Dole Foods has opened a new state-of-the-art frozen fruit facility in McDonough, Georgia, Dole's third frozen fruit facility in the United States, complimenting the existing operations in Atwater, California, and Decatur, Michigan. The new facility is approximately 60,000 square feet, fully automated and will have four manufacturing lines which when at capacity can produce 60 million pounds of frozen fruit annually. The operations will package frozen fruit for Dole's retail, food service and private label customers on the east coast.

Gray Solutions, a Gray company that provides automation, operations and information services to help food & beverage customers implement smart manufacturing, has reached a merger agreement with Stone Technologies.

A M King has partnered with ALDI U.S. to provide property consulting, design, and construction of ALDI's new facility in Loxley, Alabama. The 570,660-sq.-ft. divisional headquarters and distribution center will service more than 100 stores in southern Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and the Florida panhandle, which will mark the company's presence in 38 states.

Denver’s first cold storage speculative development is currently under construction. 76 Freeze, a 247,032-square-foot state-of-the-art, multi-temperature facility, is scheduled for completion in October 2021. Located at 189 Bromley Business Parkway in Brighton, Colorado, the brand-new facility situated on 17 acres is strategically positioned to service Colorado’s Front Range and Rocky Mountain regions. Approximately 166,000 square feet of space in the multi-user facility has been preleased to a single tenant.

People and industry news in food and beverage manufacturing for January 2021.

Since the recent passing of CEO Tom Giacomini, JBT Corporation had asked Brian Deck to fill in as interim president and CEO. On December 14^th, JBT made it official. Deck has been appointed president and chief executive officer. He has also been elected to the Board of Directors. Deck has served as interim president and CEO of JBT since June 2020 and previously served as the Company’s chief financial officer since 2014.

Baldwin Richardson Foods, one of the largest Black family-owned and operated businesses in the food industry, has promoted Erin Tolefree from Chief Operating Officer to President.

Informa Markets, show organizer of Fi Europe CONNECT, announced the winners of this year’s Innovation Awards and the Startup Innovation Challenge for their groundbreaking offerings during virtual award ceremonies held on December first and second.