Simmons Foods on Thursday announced plans for a $100 million expansion of its prepared foods facility in Van Buren, Arkansas.

The company plans to add 65,000 square feet for two new highly automated production and packaging lines. The plans include enhanced interior spaces and improved traffic flow around the site.

“This investment will create 100 new jobs, including highly skilled positions to support robotics and automation processes,” President of Simmons Prepared Foods Joel Sappenfield said. “The expansion will also support growth in the local economy and assist in meeting market demand for one of the fastest growing segments of the business – cooked products.”

“We’re excited to build on our success in the region. Our river Valley team is an important part of our company’s total operations. We have three production locations here in the River Valley as well as a Hiring Center and a Simmons Care Clinic dedicated to providing medical care with no added co-pays exclusively for our team members and their covered dependents.”

Simmons currently employs roughly 600 full-time workers at the Van Buren location, which consists of three production lines producing approximately 110 million pounds of fully cooked, premium chicken products annually. The expansion will increase annual production capacity by approximately 100 million pounds.