Two Molstead projects in Charles City both hold new jobs potential

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

Two projects being developed by a Charles City car dealer both have the potential to bring new jobs to town, he said.

One is the expansion of one of Mike Molstead’s existing dealership properties. The other is more speculative, and involves “a special project” for the county fairgrounds.

Molstead recently purchased two properties near his dealerships along South Grand Avenue. Both actions involved the approval of the Charles City Council because they were partial purchases of property that requested waiving subdivision requirements.

On Nov. 11, the council approved waiving the subdivision requirement to allow Molstead to purchase a 2½-acre parcel immediately west of the GM-Ford dealership on the west side of South Grand Avenue. The purchase was made from G&G Holding LLC, owned by Gordon and Gloria Skuster.

Mosltead told the Press that the property is for an expansion of the existing building, and he said the business is in a growth mode right now, having a good year.

“The expansion is all service,” he said. “It’s service, parts and a state-of-the art detail center, just because our service department is growing at a rapid pace.”

Sales are growing also, he said, but that drives service, and dealerships have less need for big showrooms nowadays, with much of their business at least starting out digitally.

“We’re doing a lot of our business from a long distance away, people buying on the internet,” Molstead said. “But we want to give the people who are around here an experience they can’t get anywhere else unless they were in West Des Moines or Omaha or somewhere like that. … This will put us in a league of our own.”

He said the project is out for bids now, and on paper it’s for a 19,000-square-foot addition — basically doubling the size of the building.

The recent land purchase increases the property available at that site up to 11 acres.

“We’ve added a bunch of jobs this year and we’re expecting to add quite a few more,” Molstead said.

The other purchase Molstead made recently was of 10 acres of the Pelz property on the east side of South Grand Avenue, north of his Chrysler dealership and across the highway from the Fareway and former Kmart properties.

On Dec. 7 the City Council waived the subdivision requirement to allow the Pelz Trust, managed by Werner and Edna Pelz, to sell about 10 acres of the east side of the property to Scott and Janit Heinz, who owned the property adjoining that side.

That left another 10 acres of the Pelz property, located between South Grand Avenue and the parcel that had been sold to the Heinzes.

“That opportunity was brought to me by a Realtor and the owner of the property,” Molstead said. The purchase closed Dec. 15 and work started right away.

“I don’t let dust grow under my feet too much, so my intent is to get it ready for some development and then hopefully recruit and attract some new businesses to town that would want to build in that area,” he said. “It’s pretty wide open at this point.”

Molstead said there have been some concerns about the historical nature of the property that was being torn down, and he is aware of that.

“The place was really in very, very, very rough shape, but we are salvaging everything we possibly can off of the barns and that kind of stuff,” he said. All those materials are being donated to the Floyd County Fair “for a special project.”

“They’re going to use it in new construction … but I can’t tell you any more than that. It’s supposed to be a surprise. You can tell people that we are literally salvaging every salvageable piece of history and barn wood and everything else that we possibly can, including all the beams, and anything we possibly can out of those buildings,” Molstead said.

“People will be pleasantly surprised when they’re done, what they’re doing with it,” he said about the fair project.

“The rest of it will come down and the whole thing will look very, very pleasing to the eye, and hopefully we’re going to be able to attract some new businesses to town with it. That’s the plan,” he said.