Oct. 20—HIGH POINT — Developers have finalized plans to transform a rural swath of land into the largest industrial building in High Point.

A ceremonial groundbreaking for the first phase of the 550-acre High Point North Industrial Park took place Wednesday at the future site of Ecolab's customer care center warehouse, which will have a total footprint of 1,050,560 square feet at Sandy Ridge and Gallimore Dairy roads.

It will be constructed on 113 acres that were acquired Tuesday by developer PNK Group for $16.5 million.

A Fortune 500 company with 47,000 employees, Ecolab makes and distributes cleaning and sanitizing products for food service, retail, restaurant and other types of businesses. It announced the High Point project in June as part of an expansion of its Greensboro manufacturing operations.

It will be the largest distribution facility in the Ecolab supply chain.

High Point and Guilford County have authorized $414,863 and $457,445, respectively, in cash incentives for Ecolab to assist with the project.

Ecolab will move its operations from its existing facility in Winston-Salem, which includes about 100 employees, to its new warehouse, which will be about two miles from its Greensboro campus.

"That team has done a great job for us. (Winston-Salem) is just too small of a site," said Ryan Hanson, senior vice president of North America supply chain for Ecolab. "Hopefully, the vast majority of them want to come work here. But we'll have other roles we'll continue to grow and, for sure, hire in the High Point community."

Hanson said Ecolab expects to be operational in the new facility by the end of 2023 with 125 employees. The jobs will include warehouse workers, such as forklift drivers, "pick and pack" order fulfillment workers, as well as clerical and management positions, he said.

Three divisions of Ecolab will initially occupy 825,440 square feet, with the remaining 225,120 square feet available for expansion.

The Kay Chemical Co. in Greensboro is the largest Ecolab division that will be supported out of the High Point warehouse.

"Kay services quick-service restaurants worldwide and food-service retail, so our goal is to make sure the supply chain is a competitive advantage for our sales team," Hanson said.

The land for the park was assembled by the D.H. Griffin Cos. of Greensboro, which got the entire 550 acres annexed by High Point. The company was the seller of the 113-acre portion for the Ecolab project.

It owns the remaining 437 acres of the park, for which no development plans have been announced yet.

D.H. Griffin Cos. will extend Gallimore Dairy Road to provide access to the Ecolab facility. High Point Economic Development Corp. Director Sandy Dunbeck said, based on her knowledge, it will be the largest industrial building in the city and second only to the IHFC main building, which spans 1.27 million total gross leasable square feet, in total building size.