Banking on a hot Kennett Square

It has been more than 80 years since an Italian immigrant named John Pia moved his family from California to Chester County and began growing mushrooms as a sharecropper.

Four generations later, the Pias - specifically, Michael Pia Jr., John's great-grandson - are planting more than mushrooms in the soil of Kennett Square at the edge of Kennett Township.

Their South Mill Mushroom Sales Inc. is the third-largest in the country, producing 1.3 million pounds a week, Pia said. Kaolin Mushroom Farms, their compost supply operation, serves mushroom growers. The companies, both in Kennett Square, remain the family's primary businesses, even as consolidation of the industry occurs.

Until Michael Pia Jr. took over Kennett Realty Group, the family's second-generation real estate development and management arm, his first 10 years after college were "heavy into composting," he said recently, laughing.

The family "had a few properties in the borough [Kennett Square] and slowly began acquiring other former industrial sites," recognizing the growing interest among younger people and empty-nesters in the "urban lifestyle," Pia said.

It's a trend that has found its way to other old industrial boroughs such as Phoenixville and Ambler, as well as county seats such as Media and West Chester.

For several years now, Kennett Square has been heading in the same direction. Its downtown area has seen an explosion of new businesses, especially the type that has proved critical to the reemergence of other boroughs in the Philadelphia region: restaurants.

With enough evidence that change was on its way, Kennett Realty Group two years ago began building Magnolia Place on a vacant lot between South Washington Street and Mill Road in the southeastern portion of the borough.

The site had housed "one of the larger grocery stores until suburban commercial development came along and closed it," Pia said.

Today, a new four-story brick building stands in the 600 block of West Cypress Street, with 33 apartments situated above Victory Brewing Co., which leased nearly 9,000 square feet of street-level space for a 250-seat restaurant designed, Pia emphasized, to complement the downtown Kennett Square revitalization, not compete with it.

This is Victory Brewing's second brew pub in Chester County. The original, in Downingtown, dates from 1996, and No. 3, in Parkesburg, opened just before Thanksgiving.

In addition to the rental apartments, which are all leased, there are 79 for-purchase twin homes and townhouses in the surrounding Magnolia Green, ranging from two to five bedrooms.

"Fifty-five of the townhouses are built and have been sold at prices ranging from $300,000 to $700,000," Pia said.

The next chapter in Kennett Square Realty's revitalization efforts is Cannery Row, adjacent to Magnolia Place at Cypress Street and South Mill Road, Pia said.

There will be four buildings with a total of about 20,000 square feet of retail, office, and restaurant space on the ground floors and 13 two-story apartments above.

There also will be a "bark park" for dogs, he said.

Until a fire destroyed it in mid-2006, the property held the SunnyDell Foods Mushroom Cannery. Kennett Realty entered into a joint venture with the landowner to develop the site, which straddles the Kennett Square-Kennett Township line, Pia said.

Both municipalities cooperated with the developer, with the result that "there is one cohesive project, not two, which keeps development costs down," he said.

Both towns' administrations are "pro-smart growth," Pia said.

Cannery Row approvals are expected in early spring. Pia anticipates breaking ground soon thereafter, with completion in April 2017.

aheavens@phillynews.com

215-854-2472@alheavens