Luverne Body Shop to expand, relocate

Kevin and Mary Aaker are buying a two-acre commercial lot from the Luverne Economic Development Authority to expand and relocate their Luverne Body Shop business.
At a special meeting Monday morning, the LEDA conducted a public hearing on the lot sale and, hearing no testimony from the public, approved a development agreement. 
The Aakers are buying a lot in the Gabrielson Second Industrial Subdivision in the area north of Papik Motors.
The lot is on the northwest corner of the intersection of Koehn Avenue and Commerce Drive.
The Aakers plan to invest $1 million in a 100-by-120-foot precast cement building for their auto body repair business.
According to the development agreement, they will pay $10,700 for the property, which is fully developed with water, sewer and electric hookups.
They must begin construction within a year and retain the nine full-time equivalent jobs currently generated by the business.
The EDA will offer a business incentive utility rate of 1 cent per kilowatt hour over cost for a period of 12 months.
At Monday's meeting, Kevin Aaker told the EDA he's looking forward to doing business in the new location.
"It will be easy to explain to someone where it is — turn west at McDonald's and Subway and we're right north of Papik Motors," he said. "It makes sense."
He said the business move has been in the plans for a long time.
"Verlon (Shearer) and I started together in 1990, and now we have eight full-time employees with Mary and me," Aaker said.
He said they've been adding employees in recent years, anticipating the move.
Their current building on West Gabrielson Road was once home to Trucker's Territory before it became the Luverne Body Shop in 1997.
The building is 90 by 140 feet, and the Body Shop currently uses two-thirds of it, leasing out the remaining space to various trucking firms like Riggs and Sandbulte through the years for storage or wash bays or as a base of operations for their businesses.
Now plans are in the works to sell the current Luverne Body Shop building to Jaycox Implement for its truck business.
"That was kind of the other side of it that makes it feasible," Aaker said about the agreement with Jaycox.
Aaker said he's looking forward to getting started on the construction project, which Luverne contractor Okie Honken will oversee. "We'll try to use local contractors as much as possible," Aaker said.