Soft drink producer set to expand after council decision

A BOUTIQUE regional soft drink producer can now move ahead with a big expansion after the council removed “onerous” costs associated with it.

Cooks Soft Drinks has been approved for an expansion.

A BOUTIQUE regional soft drink producer can now move ahead with a big expansion after the Toowoomba Regional Council removed "onerous" costs associated with it.

Cooks Soft Drinks, currently based at 1 Yandilla St in Pittsworth, was given the green light in April to establish a new production and retail centre just up the road at a current industrial building on 130 Yandilla St.

The new centre, which would operate from 8am to 5pm Monday to Friday and 8am to 11am on Saturday, is slated to produce up to 60,000 litres of soft drink and other beverages a year.

But the applicant returned to the council to contest several conditions requiring it to build kerbing, channelling and a new driveway onto Evans St, at the back of the property.

But according to a report by Baker Rossow Consulting Engineers, submitted by Cooks Soft Drinks, the works would cost more than $50,000.

"Following development approval, the applicant sought a quotation from Newlands Group specifically to undertake frontage works to Evans St as required under (the) conditions," the report said.

"In their quotation dated May 1, 2020, Newlands Group provided a cost estimate of $55,626 complete these works."

Precinct Urban Planning's Paul Kelly said the estimated cost of the works was worth more than 10 per cent of what the applicant paid for the property in the first place.

The Baker Rossow report also said the installation of kerbing and channelling would cause ponding to occur on Evans St, since it didn't have underground stormwater drainage.

Both aspects were disputed by council officers, who argued the works would instead cost about $6000 on their estimates.

"The proposed changes are recommended to be refused - the conditions have been imposed to ensure the development applies with the applicable assessment benchmarks contained in the planning scheme," TRC planner Jayden Forbes-Mitchell said.

"These conditions are relevant to and not an unreasonable imposition on the development on the use of the premises as a consequence of the development."

Deputy Mayor Geoff McDonald moved a new motion granted the change to conditions, which was voted in by the majority of councillors.

Cooks Soft Drinks owner Brendan Cavanagh said he had seen a significant uptake in recent months.

"Full steam ahead as quick as we can (with the expansion)," he said.

"Things have really ramped up and we are still operating on stock we've already had bottled.

"We're working as hard as we can to get things moving.

"We've had the shop operating since May (at the new site), and the intake in a week now is more than what we made in a month before.

"We've had interest from distributors and shops that want to buy in bulk.

"Even with COVID-19, we picked up local customers just on our delivery runs - customers wanted to support local suppliers."