Coke holds grand opening for new facility

The Coca-Cola Bottling Company held a ribbon cutting today for its new, expanded facility in north Baton Rouge. The 781,000-square-foot plant is worth about $178 million. It incorporates many of Coca-Cola’s environmentally friendly initiatives and is the first bottler to be LEED-certified as a green building. While the plant is open, Coke still is busy making additions. The company is adding two lines to the plant in order to distribute VitaminWater to bottlers across Louisiana and the South. The company expects the expansion to add up to 113 jobs by 2012 with an average salary of $45,000. This will bring the total employment at the plant up to more than 600 workers. Baton Rouge is now a regional production and distribution hub for the Coca-Cola system, officials say. Construction on the plant began in May 2007; the expansion was announced in May 2008.