If you cracked open a bottle of Pepsi-Cola back in the 1940s, there’s a good chance that soda was bottled right here in Greenville.
Today, the site of the old Pepsi Bottling Plant at 701 Poinsett Highway still stands strong, but the 56,000-square-foot structure will soon get a second life as Crescent Startup Community, a large-scale mixed-use Innovation District that aims to be a place where startups, entrepreneurs and business leaders can gather.
Read our full profile on Crescent Startup Community
The goal of the community is to make history by growing the Upstate into a major tech and innovation hub. Its tenants now have the added advantage of operating out of a building that has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places after a review by the State Historic Preservation Office and the National Parks Service.
Situated on seven acres of land on Poinsett Highway, the new startup community is the brainchild of Hartness Development, which has long owned the property, along with a team of local stakeholders.
Back in 2021, when Hartness first announced plans for the space, the building was vacant other than the debris of old Pepsi bottles littering the corners.
Now Crescent is on track to open in late spring 2024 with the completion of Phase One’s Crescent One building. The remainder of the district will open in phases with new construction and the creation of green space.
Fast facts:
- 7.15 acre site, with potential to add 15 to 20 acres in future phases.
- 58,000 square feet of existing building and shed space.
- 134,000 square feet of new construction.
What is a startup community?
Consider it a physical co-working space whose secret sauce is its programatic underpinnings, such as:
- Assisting with access to grants and early capital
- Legal aid and advice
- Mentorship
- In-depth entrepreneurial curriculums
- Pitch events
More than soda
The former Pepsi bottling plant, which will be preserved to ensure its historic attributes remain, is not the only tie to history for Crescent Startup Community.
The land adjacent to the building, on which future buildings could rise in the second phase of the project, is the site of the Piedmont Shirt Co. building. Only the second garment factory in Greenville’s history, the company was founded by 28-year-old Russian Jewish immigrant Shepard Saltzman. He was the first Jewish textile mill owner in the Upstate.
During World War II, Saltzman helped Jewish immigrants escape from Europe and brought them to Greenville, where he offered them employment at the factory. He later worked to support the establishment of Israel after the war.
Saltzman died in 1955 but his son-in-law continued to grow the business. It eventually was incorporated at Piedmont Industries in 1971 and went on to become the 4th largest manufacturer of shirts in the nation, with $30 million in sales in 1984. It closed suddenly in 1990, unable to compete with the drastically lower prices of imports.
The original building was demolished in 2015.
