Indianapolis coffee company plans to open facility in Lafayette

Indianapolis-based Copper Moon World Coffee is poised to begin roasting coffee in Lafayette if it receives property tax abatements in Tippecanoe County.

“We’re a wholesale coffee roaster,” said Cary Gutwein, president of Copper Moon World Coffee. “By and large ... we roast and pack in our brand, and we sell regionally and nationally.”

Copper Moon World Coffee plans to buy a 35,059-square-foot manufacturing facility at 1759 S. Veterans Memorial Parkway East. The site is the former Brenneco service facility, east of the Journal & Courier’s printing facility and southeast of IU Health Arnett Hospital, said Jody Hamilton, economic developer for Greater Lafayette Commerce.

The Indianapolis-based coffee roaster is about halfway through the process to secure tax abatements on its real estate and its equipment, which Gutwein said is needed before closing on the property and formally announcing intentions for the Lafayette operations.

The company started more than 25 years ago in Kentucky and moved to Indianapolis in 2005, Gutwein said Tuesday.

The Tippecanoe County Council approved the acres around the former Brenneco facility an economic revitalization area at its meeting last week. This move also OK’d the first hearing of the tax abatements, council President Roland Winger said. The final reading on the abatements will come at the council’s Oct. 9 meeting. The commissioners also must give their approval at their Oct. 1 meeting.

Tax abatements phase in the taxes assessed on property and equipment over the term of the abatement. For example, a company with a 10-year abatement would pay nothing the first year on the assessed value of the abated property or equipment. In subsequent years, one-tenth of the property or equipment taxes are added until the business is paying the full tax by the last year of the agreement.

If approved, a 10-year abatement would be applied to up to $500,000 of assessed value in real estate improvements to the building, Hamilton said. The council also will consider a seven-year abatement on $800,000 of assessed value on new equipment.

All totaled, both abatements would save Copper Moon World Coffee about $60,000 in its tax obligations, Hamilton said.

Gutwein, who is from the Lafayette area, is related to county Councilman Andy Gutwein, who recused himself from the discussions and the voting to avoid a conflict of interest, Hamilton said.

The county must approve the abatements because the facility currently is outside of Lafayette city limits, but the area is expected to be annexed into the city by the time the abatements take effect.

“This tax abatement is unique,” Hamilton said. “The building is actually in the county. ... Come January ... that building will come into the city.”

“It puts a vacant building back into use,” Lafayette Economic Development Director Dennis Carson said.

Copper Moon World Coffee would bring 19 jobs in the first two years, he said, which means more revenue for governments and a healthier local economy.