BRECKSVILLE, Ohio — Friday’s groundbreaking in Brecksville at Sherwin-Williams’ future Research and Development facility marks the start of years worth of additional business in the Cleveland suburb.
The roughly $250 million facility will be 600,000 square feet and will house 900 employees once it’s finished in the next few years. It’s going to be built on the former Veterans Administration facility which has been vacant for most of the last decade.
Previous plans, called Valor Acres, laid out a plan to redevelop the space before Sherwin-Williams decided to use it for it’s sizable Research & Development needs. The company’s Downtown Cleveland Headquarters designs are still working their way through Cleveland’s approval process. The next meeting regarding that plan is November 30.
Sherwin-Williams President and CEO John Morikis told the crowd that while the COVID pandemic might have slowed down their progress in creating their new facilites, they are forging ahead now.
"We hope the path we travel together can serve as a model to attract other business to the region," said Morikis.
Over the next few years, Morikis says the existing 3,500 Sherwin-Williams employees will be joined by 400 new employees spread between the downtown headquarters and the Brecksville Research and Development facilities.
Local impact
Even before the first shovels moved the first piles of dirt, Juice Lab owner Dom DiGeronimo tells News 5 the project has been hard to miss.
“It makes small talk easier,” said DiGeronimo, who is related to the family that runs the construction business. “People are very excited about it.”
Juice Lab has only been in Brecksville, less than three miles from the Sherwin-Williams facility, since December of 2020. Since then, DiGeronimo says the commercial area around the corner of Chippewa and Brecksville Roads keeps getting busier, and 900 new Sherwin-Williams employees will only help everyone even more.
“When I found out, I was like, wow, this is going to be three or four years of a good opportunity for new customers, a lot of foot traffic,” said DiGeronimo.
Long before those new neighbors are ready to stop by for lunch, DiGeronimo points out that there will be hundreds of construction workers on the site for at few years who will also need food. He says it’s already started happening with other projects nearby.
“There will be two construction works that come in and one guy will go to Burger Fresh and the other will come here,” said DiGeronimo.
That has the young business already planning out giving out samples and gift cards while construction is going on to capitalize on that new business.
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