Grain hopper manufacturer proposes Whitestown facility

A Nebraska-based grain hopper manufacturer plans to open a retail and repair facility in Whitestown.

Timpte Industries Inc. has requested a real property tax abatement from the town of Whitestown as an incentive for building the 12,100-square-foot facility at 3945 S. Indianapolis Road.

The facility would be constructed near Exit 133 off Interstate 65. Timpte said it plans to spend about $2.2 million on the project.

It would be Timpte’s first Indiana operation and would create 14 jobs in Whitestown, paying an average wage of $26.62 an hour, with benefits valued at an additional $5 to $8 an hour, town documents state. The company would hire skilled, clerical and salaried employees.

Construction on the project could begin as soon as next month. The company plans to hire four or five full-time employees in 2018; four more in 2019, three in 2020 and two in 2021.

Timpte has requested a seven-year real property tax abatement from Whitestown that would save the company 60 percent, or about $200,000, over the abatement period.

The town council is slated to consider the abatement at its meeting Wednesday night.

Timpte manufactures grain trailers at its 195,000-square-foot headquarters in David City, Nebraska, which opened in 1978. The company traces its roots to Denver starting in the 1880s, supplying and repairing deliver wagons and buggies, according to its website.

The company produced its first semitrailer in 1931, and after being sold to Ohio Brass Co., it manufactured the first grain hopper trailer in 1963. Timpte Industries Inc. was formed in 1970. 

Timpte has sales and services branches in Iowa, Nebraska, Illinois, South Dakota, Minnesota and Wisconsin.