A new airline food production facility will be built on the former site of Covington’s old White Castle plant.
The company behind the project, MarfoFMA, received financial incentive approvals from Kenton County Fiscal Court late last month. It is expected to move into the old White Castle facility on Rolling Hills Drive. The location will be the company’s first operations in the United States.
MarfoFMA is a branch of family-owned company Fleury Michon, which was originally founded in 1905 in France and is a well-known producer throughout Europe. The company bought Quebec-based company FMA in 2006 and Netherlands-based company Marfo in 2019 before merging the two into a single business entity.
“This represents an important milestone for the family-owned Fleury Michon Group and its international catering business,” Arnaud Prévéraud, North America area manager of MarfoFMA, said in the governor’s announcement. “Through this investment, we will be able to add additional capacity to our North American operations, which are currently served exclusively by FMA based in Quebec. We intend to train our local teams in Covington in order to establish our know-how over the long term, for the benefit of our airline customers departing from U.S. airports.”
Public records indicate that developers and officials have been coordinating to move the food company into the old distribution center, bringing an expected 98 full-time jobs, 78 of which are slated to be physically located in Covington and Kenton County. The 78 local jobs are expected to pay at least $34.61 per hour in wages, according to state records.
The governor’s office said the move represented about $37.5 million in investment. Public records corroborate this. MarfoFMA bought the property on Jan. 12 for $5.3 million, according to county records, and state records indicate they plan to spend just over $37 million on the project. A $37 million bonding package will soon be up for a vote before the Covington Board of Commissioners.
The Kentucky Cabinet of Economic Development, on the other hand, has already approved $200,000 in aid for construction costs and is in the process of approving $1.5 million in state tax incentives.
“As Covington continues to grow, we’re proud to welcome MarfoFMA to our community and honored that they chose our city for their first U.S. location,” said Covington Mayor Ron Washington in the governor’s announcement. “This investment not only brings new jobs but also breathes new life into a vacant facility in south Covington. Transforming the former White Castle distribution plant into a thriving manufacturing operation is exactly the kind of forward momentum we strive for.”
The company hopes to begin recruiting for the jobs, which include cooks, line workers, lift drivers and other staff, later this year and open the plant sometime in the second quarter of 2027.