Lantmännen Unibake experienced a $1 million expansion to its St. Petersburg, Fla., headquarters facility. The 7,500-square-foot remodeling project includes Phase 1, a new 2,200-square-foot research and development lab and customer welcome/reception area.

“Our new welcome and R&D center will now provide us with more office space and space to conduct meetings with our customers in the creation of new breads, which meet consumer trends and our customers’ requirements,” says Scott Kolinski, president of the Euro-Bake brand producer.

Phase 2, which will be completed by the end of the year, is dedicated to food safety and improvement of employee areas, including enlarging its current bakery’s footprint to make room for new, state-of-the-art personnel hygiene equipment. The fully automated equipment guides employees through a series of cleaning stations that are required for entry into the bread production area. The stations include boot/sole scrubbing, hand washing, hand drying and hand sanitizing. Phase 2 will also include remodeling of employee locker rooms and the break room.

The newly remodeled Lantmännen Unibake facility is located at 230 19th Street South. The space was formerly a storage building across the street from the Lantmännen Unibake bakery facility, located at 1927 4th Avenue South.