Meat processor Empirical Foods is committing $250 million – the largest capital investment in its history – to open a new plant in Garden City, KS that will produce ground beef, Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly announced in a recent release.

“After a long evaluation period to identify the perfect location for our new facility, we are pleased to settle on Garden City and could not have identified a better, more welcoming community,” said Nick Roth, the president of Empirical Technology Inc., the parent company of Empirical Foods, in a statement. “The State of Kansas, Garden City and the Finney County Economic Development Corporation have been excellent partners to the beef industry and companies like ours.”

The company said its plans to open a new manufacturing and processing facility in Garden City stem from increased demand for lean ground beef products. Once operational, the facility will double Empirical Foods’ current capacity for ground beef.

A groundbreaking event was held at the site on October 22. About 250 new jobs will be created when the facility opens. Empirical Foods expects the project to reach completion between 2022 and 2023.