Monsanto's $400 Million Chesterfield Expansion Could Have Creve Coeur Impact

Updated 2:10 p.m. with more reaction from company and city officials.

Chesterfield will be at the heart of a $400 million expansion announced by agribusiness giant Monsanto today as it seeks to add more plant growth chambers, offices and laboratory space to its Chesterfield Village Research center over the next three years.

The company announced the major news Tuesday and in a press release said the project will add 675 jobs to the already 1,000 positions at the Chesterfield site.  The new facilities will be aimed at developing the company’s seed and trait pipeline while allowing for coloration among researches to find ways to make agriculture more productive and sustainable.  

“Monsanto has pledged to help those in agriculture find new ways to produce more while using less of our globes resources,” said Robb Fraley, Monsanto’s chief technology officer.

According to a report in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Monsanto announced the news Tuesday morning with Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon at the annual International Bio Convention in Chicago.  The state is kicking in $31.5 million in tax incentives to help fund the project.

Nixon praised the company and said this latest investment helps further establish Missouri as a “biotech powerhouse.”

"One of the fastest-growing sectors of Missouri's economy is in science and technology, and I remain committed to embracing these industries to transform our economy and create next-generation jobs,” he said.

The release stated that the expansion will add 36 new technologically advanced greenhouses capable of being programmed to represent any climate around the world. Currently, the site spans 1.5 million square feet and includes approximately 250 laboratories, 122 plant growth chambers and two acres of greenhouses.

Creve Coeur Impact

The company said its commercial and corporate teams will continue to occupy its Creve Coeur campus, which also currently houses lab spaces. Once employees are transferred to Chesterfield, those lab spaces may be converted to other uses, Fraley said. 

Patch asked company officials for a rough estimate of how many jobs would move from Creve Coeur to Chesterfield, if Creve Coeur was built-out and why Chesterfield was a better fit. A company spokesperson said the move allows Monsanto to put an entire team of technology researchers and scientists in a state of the art facility at one site.  The spokeswoman did not provide a number of jobs which would be added in Creve Coeur but stressed that Tuesday's announcement means more jobs at both sites.

The city of Creve Coeur has spent time over the last few years building a relationship with the biotech interests located in the city, from Monsanto to the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center and others. Scott Saunders, the Ward 4 Councilman who has been involved in those efforts told Patch via email Tuesday that despite that effort, people can't expect all biotech sector growth to just happen here.

"There is a tremendous ongoing commitment broadly to the frontiers of plant science biotech in Creve Coeur. Not only from the standpoint of the continuing activities at the Monsanto Creve Coeur campus…but by virtue obviously of the Danforth Plant Sciences Center…the ongoing commitment of Wexford Science and Technology at BRDG Park (which recall is only one-third built out at this time)…and the St. Louis County funding of the Helix Center. There is a tremendous node of diverse plant sciences research going on in Creve Coeur…with its own plans for expansion…it just can’t all possibly fit within the borders of our city. I’m personally very pleased with what we have in Creve Coeur," he wrote.

City Administrator Mark Perkins told Patch that in recent years Monsanto did consider building an additional building or buildings in Creve Coeur but instead went ahead and purchased the former Pfizer campus in Chesterfield where this latest expansion is taking place. 

"While they may be moving their research functions to the former Pfizer campus in Chesterfield, they have indicated their intention to maintain their corporate headquarters (including administrative, financial and IT functions) in the City of Creve Coeur," Mayor Barry Glantz reiterated Tuesday.

"I hope this is great news for both communities – and look forward to working collaboratively with all involved for the betterment of the St. Louis region," he wrote in an email to Patch.

Construction in Chesterfield is expected to be completed in 2017, and teams will begin moving to the Chesterfield site in phases beginning at that time.

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