Construction Equipment Guide
470 Maryland Drive
Fort Washington, PA 19034
800-523-2200
Tue April 14, 2015 - Southeast Edition
Approximately 600 guests made their way through the doors of Thompson Machinery’s new Tupelo, Miss., facility on March 25 for an official ribbon cutting ceremony followed by an open house. The event commemorates the official opening of Thompson Machinery’s new Tupelo, Miss., area store — a newly constructed 44,000-sq.-ft. facility situated on 15 acres fronting Highway 78 (to become I-22 when complete) at Highway 9 South in the Belden/Sherman area of Pontotoc County, Miss. The location consists of 10,000 sq. ft. (929 sq m) of office space, 10,000 sq. ft. of warehouse space and more than 20,000 sq. ft. (1,858 sq m) of shop space. The new facility serves all of Thompson Machinery’s divisions including forestry, on-highway truck, power generation, earthmoving/construction, and the Cat Rental Store.
Company officials said the main focus and challenge in design and construction was to create the best possible customer experience. Thompson Machinery consulted an Atlanta based design firm that has previously worked with other Caterpillar dealers on research for building design. With a bit of outside help, the final building layout was an in-house design coordinated by Thompson’s Steve Lainhart. Location was extremely important in strategic placement of this facility, for ease of access for the forestry and on-highway truck markets. The Tupelo area is recognized as Thompson Machinery’s largest market opportunity for forestry product sales and support. The volume of highway traffic at the front of this new location on Highway 78 represents a tremendous opportunity to increase on-highway truck service. The company incorporated five bays specifically designated for on-highway truck service in the design of the new building.
As the event was wrapping up, Thompson Machinery president DeWitt (De) Thompson V said, “I’m very pleased. I think our team did a great job preparing for the event. It was great to be here and to catch up with some customers I haven’t seen in a while.” Thompson said he was thankful for those involved in the building process of the new Tupelo facility.
“We had a lot of help from a variety of folks in the community who helped make this happen. It was a wonderful team effort. Everyone got involved early on in the conversations of not only where we wanted to be located, but how the facility should “flow” and look. They really came together quite well,” said De Thompson V.
This finished project is part of a five-year facilities improvement plan in place for Thompson Machinery. The company’s next endeavor includes adding shop bays to the Columbus, Miss., facility.