Everything is bigger in Texas, and Fort Worth now has a Big Ass Fans manufacturing facility to underline the point.
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The Kentucky-based company known for its high-volume, low-speed fans opened its new 210K SF facility at Fort Worth Commerce Center this week with an eye on expanding production. The facility will serve as its central U.S. distribution hub, The Dallas Morning News reported.
Big Ass Fans CEO Ken Walma said the company plans to hire 100 employees for its Fort Worth facility, though he expects that number to grow with the business.
“Texas is our No. 1 market and home to several of our largest customers – it's also where many of our valued suppliers are based,” Walma said in a statement. “Proximity to suppliers and increased manufacturing capacity, along with ready access to a skilled workforce, will enable us to better and more quickly serve our customers across the state and region."
Big Ass Fans started out serving the farming sector as HVLS Fan Co. before gaining recognition and expanding into other industries, according to the release. The name change followed customers calling to ask, “Are you the ones who make those big ass fans?"
The Big Ass Fans news is the latest in a busy year for Fort Worth. As the No. 2 fastest-growing city in the U.S., it is on track to surpass 1 million residents this year.
The city is preparing for more than $2B in investment in its downtown area, including work that will reimagine Panther Island as a mixed-use waterfront district. Fort Worth Economic Development Director Robert Sturns called that a “generational project” at a Bisnow event in the city earlier this month.
On the industrial front, e-commerce industrial distribution firm McMaster-Carr Supply Co. has a $225M regional headquarters in the works in AllianceTexas, the 27,000-acre master-planned industrial community north of Fort Worth. AllianceTexas was home to 574 companies and valued at $15.3B at the close of 2023.
“Fort Worth is a city of 350 square miles, and on any given day, it feels like 300 square miles of that are under development somewhere, right?” Sturns said at the Bisnow event. “As we look around the city, it's not $100M deals or $200M deals. It's half a billion, it’s a billion, it's $2B. These are the types of things that we're dealing with now.”
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