Skender Completes Construction on Greater Chicago Food Depository Expansion

The expansion enables local anti-hunger organization to better serve populations experiencing unique barriers to food access. 

Skender, as general contractor, has completed construction on a 38,000-square-foot facility expansion for the Greater Chicago Food Depository (Food Depository), a nonprofit anti-hunger organization that provides food for families and individuals experiencing food insecurity and works in partnership with the community to end hunger across Chicago and Cook County. The new prepared meals center, located at 4100 W. Ann Lurie Place, was completed seven weeks ahead of schedule and has enabled the food bank to increase its response to hunger with capacity to distribute up to 10,000 scratch-made meals per day.

The expansion added a commercial kitchen for meal preparation, cold storage spaces to support the food preparation areas, a new lobby and 11.5 acres of site work with ample parking for volunteers and guests. Skender also coordinated and facilitated the installation of a singular Hydroponic Container Farming Unit, which enables the Food Depository to grow its own fresh herbs for prepared meals. Now fully operational, the new facility is being used to create and distribute healthy prepared meals for older adults, people living with disabilities and other neighbors facing food insecurity.

“For 45 years, the Food Depository has been driven by a vision for a hunger free community,” said Kate Maehr, Executive Director and CEO of the Food Depository. “With our new prepared meals center we have dramatically increased our capacity to offer nourishing, ready to eat meals for our neighbors at greatest risk of food insecurity. This accelerates our mission to end hunger.”

The facility expansion, part of the Food Depository’s Nourish Project, achieved Minority and Women-Owned Business (M/WBE) participation of 36.24%, exceeding the established target of 32%. The project has successfully achieved LEED Silver certification.

“The Greater Chicago Food Depository is a pillar of our community, and it’s been an honor to help them expand and serve more people than ever before,” said Eric Fiket, Senior Project Manager and Team Leader at Skender.

The project team included JLL as owner’s rep, Partners by Design as architect, Skender as general contractor, V3 Companies as civil engineer, Buro Happold as structural engineer, Salas O’Brien as mechanical engineer, and PM&E Partners as food processing engineer.

Project photography by Tom Harris.