HD Fowler Co. is betting on Tri-City growth.

The Bellevue-based company is expanding its Pasco location with a 17,000-square-foot office and shop to serve its growing business. HD Fowler provides pipes and other water system parts to area contractors and builders and has seen business soar since it first opened here in 2001.

Jed Fowler, president, said the Pasco branch opened with just three people, but growth and development soon followed. Today, it has more than 30 in Pasco, one of 23 locations.

Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, it was decided it needed more room. It bought a 7.27-acre with a “small building” at 1336 Dietrich Road in 2017 and made plans.

“We needed a big building,” he said.

The $1.7 million building will have a two-story, 7,000-square-foot office with about 9,000 square feet of shop and warehouse space in the back. The old building will be retained for storage.

Cole Architects is the designer. Baker Construction of Spokane is the contractor. The city of Pasco issued permits in March. It broke ground in April. The president said it should be complete by Dec. 5, and furnished after that.

Footings were installed by mid-May.

It will serve as a distribution center for the various water-related products it sells. HD Fowler also provides value-added services by customizing pipes and pumps for its customers.

The added space will let it expand to add products such as hardscape materials for landscapers, upgraded pumps for septic systems and pipe that is fused rather than welded.

“It’s a good spread,” he said.

HD Fowler provides water system gear to residential and commercial builders but does not serve agriculture.

“We sell the products that move clean water in one direction and what we euphemistically call ‘gray water’ in the other,” he said, referring to sewage.

HD Fowler employs about 590 people across the company.