Belgium's United Petfood plans to increase U.S. presence; buys Mishawaka facility

MISHAWAKA — The city's Wellness Pet Co. production plant at 1121 W. 11th St. has been sold to a Belgium-based international food manufacturer.

United Petfood announced the purchase last month. It is the company's first manufacturing plant in the United States.

"We are excited to take our first steps into the U.S. market with the acquisition of the Mishawaka facility," Elodie Fleury, United Petfood vice president Americas, said in a news release about the announcement. "This acquisition allows us to better serve our American customers with locally produced, high-quality pet food. We see tremendous opportunities for growth and collaboration and are excited about the potential for synergies between our operations across different continents."

The company said in the announcement that the purchase gives it its first manufacturing plant in the United States. United Petfood operates plants in Belgium, Denmark, Hungary, Italy, Spain, Romania and Turkey. It also has five production facilities in France, three in Poland, three in the United Kingdom and six in the Netherlands, being active in more than 95 countries worldwide.

In the sale announcement, Reed Howlett, CEO of Wellness Pet, said Wellness acquired a much larger facility in 2022 in Decatur, Ark., and that the plant there "… is well-suited to support the company’s growth in the near and medium term."

“We’re pleased United Petfood will assume ownership of the Mishawaka facility," Howlett said in a prepared statement. "This will ensure a smooth transition for our team members who have been working at the facility and part of the Wellie family for many years. We are proud to have been Mishawaka community members for almost two decades.”

Fleury said Thursday via email in response to questions about the acquisition that the plant in Mishawaka currently is producing pet products and the company has been able to keep all its employees. He added that plans are to grow activity in the U.S. market, which, he said, will increase the activity at the Mishawaka site.

"Our objective is to expand alongside our customers, both within Europe and globally," Fleury said. "Establishing a production site in the U.S. was a logical progression to bolster our market presence. We have been exploring the possibility of a U.S. production site to further solidify our position in the market."

The plant in Mishawaka began as Eagle Products in 1970, owned by the Cocquyt family, and has a long history in Mishawaka. Joe Cocquyt, who died in 2008, developed the Eagle Pack line in 1983, marking the beginning of the super-premium category in the pet food market.

In 2004, the company was sold to a private equity group, Swander Pace Capital , and in 2007, it was sold to Berwind , a fifth-generation, family-owned investment management company out of Philadelphia.

In 2008, Berwind purchased Wellness pet food and, in 2009, Berwind merged Eagle Pack Pet Foods and Wellness under the name WellPet.

Pet plant odors over the yers

The Mishawaka pet food plant over the years has dealt with issues dealing with the odors coming from the plant during processing operations there.

For years, people living downwind from the plant have had to deal with intermittent strong odors that result from the untreated steam from the food processing.

Plant history: Wellness Pet takes steps to mitigate odors at its Mishawaka plant

In 2016, an odor abatement system was installed and was not found to be effective. Three years later, plant officials announced a newer technology that was later installed at the plant to help mitigate the smells when pet food was being manufactured. The work was part of other plant improvements the company proposed for the site.

But Wellness Pet said in 2022 that some of the plant improvement had been placed on hold , and it later was urged to install the odor abatement system despite the delayed improvement plans.

But the Common Council , seeing that Wellness Pet's tax abatement application calling for the odor and other plant improvements had not completely been realized, voted in 2023 to rescind tax abatements for the failure to follow through on the plant expansion plan it had proposed.

Email Tribune staff writer Greg Swiercz at gswiercz@sbtinfo.com

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Belgium's United Petfood plans to increase U.S. presence; buys Mishawaka facility