Taylor Chip expects to begin selling ice cream at its Lancaster County stores this summer, but the cookie maker’s line of frozen desserts won’t be coming from a creamery in West Hempfield Township.
Citing rising development costs, Taylor Chip recently pulled the plug on its plans to build a 20,000-square foot creamery on a vacant parcel at 1780 Columbia Ave. As it looks for a different place to make its own ice cream, Taylor Chip is already having its cookie-inspired flavors made by another Pennsylvania ice cream maker and sold at stores in York and Philadelphia.
Taylor Chip’s store in Manheim Township and the one at its production facility in Intercourse will begin selling ice cream this summer, said Doug Taylor, who owns Taylor Chip with his wife Sara. He declined to name the creamery now making the ice cream.
“This is what we’re doing right now but we hope to fulfill our dream of having our own facility to do it,” Doug Taylor said. “We’re looking at other options, very aggressively.”
In June 2021, Taylor Chip spent $165,000 on an undeveloped 3.3-acre tract just east of Columbia Borough. Back then, Doug Taylor said construction quotes for the planned creamery were around $3 million for what was expected to be a $12 million project. As they worked to get necessary municipal and state approvals for the project, though, those construction quotes more than doubled.
“To spend $6.2 million on a building when you can go lease a space or renovate an existing space, it just didn’t make sense anymore to do it and the bank also agreed,” Doug Taylor said.
As construction costs rose, the Taylors were also spending money drawing up plans for the building while covering costs to get necessary township approvals for the project. They also sought some required easements and permits from the state Department of Transportation.
“It’s just the project there got so expensive that it was just not feasible. We had already dumped over $500,000 of our own cash into land development and ground purchase,” Doug Taylor said.
READ: Taylor Chip gets $3.5M state grant and loan for expansion in West Hempfield Township
A learning experience
The Taylors decided last summer that new construction in West Hempfield Township would just be too expensive. They listed the property for sale in January and are now focused on finding something to lease or buying property they can renovate.
“It’s a good site for someone who’s going to do a less aggressive thing than we were trying to do. But for use it ended up being too costly,” he said.
The property just east of the Columbia Borough line has an asking price of $795,000. The listing from North American Commercial Realty mentions that it includes some engineering and sketch plans as well as preliminary approvals for a 20,000-square-foot warehouse or plant.
Doug Taylor said proceeds from a land sale would be used for the next iteration of the creamery. State and federal grants totaling $870,000 that Taylor Chip was previously awarded for the creamery project may also be available.
A $470,000 grant Taylor Chip was selected for in 2020 through the Pennsylvania Dairy Investment Program that could still potentially be used for a creamery at another location. Also potentially available is a $400,000 grant Taylor Chip was selected for from the Resilient Food System Infrastructure grant program, a federal program administered by the state.
“Those two combined all working toward this project is what the goal would be,” Doug Taylor said.
There’s some urgency to find a new creamery location since Taylor said the grants could expire. Representatives for the state agencies overseeing the grants did not respond before this story was published with information about the possible expiration of the grants.
Taylor said an option for some $2.6 million in Small Business Association loans for the West Hempfield Township project has already expired, Doug Taylor said.
The Taylors initially began selling their cookies at pop-up events in 2018, which was an expansion of cookie-making they did together when they were dating. They turned their hobby and part-time business into a full-time venture later in 2018 when they opened a stand in Lancaster Marketplace, a former vendor marketplace in Manheim Township.
Taylor Chip expanded rapidly at Lancaster Marketplace, helped by social media savvy and a focus on shipping its oversized cookies that got a big boost both due to pandemic-inspired buying habits. Today, Taylor Chip has 60 employees and seven locations.
In addition to selling through its own stores, Taylor Chip also operates a wholesale business and does a robust online sales business. Doug Taylor declined to disclose the company’s annual sales.
Doug Taylor chalked the failed West Hempfield Township creamery plan up as a learning experience.
“There are so many people that are afraid to start a business, and I understand that,” he said. “There are a lot of risks, there are a lot of unknowns, you don’t win every time.”
