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A Port Washington, New York-based home furnishings company plans to expand its distribution operations in Whitestown and hire 60 new employees by 2027.
Safavieh, which sells rugs, indoor and outdoor furniture, lighting, wall art and accessories, is planning a 601,350-square-foot warehouse on 37 acres near the intersection of County Road 500 South and Perry Worth Road at Ambrose Property Group’s Indianapolis Logistics Park Northwest.
Safavieh is planning a total investment of $62 million on the new project, including real property ($45 million), personal property ($6 million) and land cost ($11 million), according to documents submitted to the town by the company.
The Whitestown Town Council on Wednesday night unanimously approved a five-year real property tax abatement for Safavieh’s promise to hire 60 workers with a collective annual payroll of $2.7 million. The company plans to reach its hiring goal within the next three years.
The tax abatement will decrease 20% per year and save Safavieh $1.95 million, Boone County Economic Development Corp. CEO Molly Whitehead told council members.
Safavieh has owned and operated a 470,000-square-foot distribution facility for about five years at 5635 Albert S. White Dr. in Whitestown. The company will continue operations at its initial facility and it will own the new facility when it opens next year.
“We love being in Whitestown. We like the team that we currently have. And we’d like to expand what we are doing there, which is basically serving the Midwest area,” Safavieh principal Darius Yaraghi told members of the Town Council.
Whitehead said Safavieh will generate a $4.5 million real property tax levy and $138,000 in local income tax revenue over the five-year tax abatement period.
Specializing in producing rugs, Safavieh was founded in 1914 in Iran by Kazem Yaraghi. His grandsons, Arash and Cyrus Yaraghi, opened a showroom in 1978 in New York City before the rest of the Yaraghi family moved to the United States the following year to escape the Iranian Revolution, according to the company’s website.
Safavieh has manufacturing and warehousing facilities on three continents. Along with Whitestown, Safavieh’s distribution facilities in the U.S. are in California, Georgia, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Texas.
Last month, Indianapolis-based Ambrose announced plans to build the 95.5-acre Indianapolis Logistics Park Northwest at the northeast corner of the new Interstate 65 Exit 131 at County Road 550 South.
Two 233,000-square-foot buildings are currently under construction at the site, while a 248,000-square-foot building will also be developed as a build-to-suit project.
Construction on the 233,000-square-foot buildings is expected to be complete in early 2025. Companies will be able to lease as little as 40,000 square feet of space at the two buildings.
Ambrose is working with the Indianapolis office of Dallas-based CBRE Group to market and lease the industrial park.
The general contractor for the buildings is Indianapolis-based Compass Commercial Construction Group, and Lawrence-based Curran Architecture and North Carolina-based Kimley-Horn are handling design.
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