-October 20,2022-
Amazon is changing their story about the new 1.1 million square foot Visalia warehouse – called HLA6 – opening up this month. Spokesperson Natalie Banke says the huge new facility will be a distribution facility and not a same-day service service – clarifying earlier statements to the media.
“Unfortunately customers in Visalia will not have the same-day service in their region (at least for now), as this is a distribution center, not a fulfillment center.”
Instead, the center will send products to same-day service centers elsewhere. The new Visalia building and its workforce “will first support same-day fulfillment centers in Nevada, with plans to expand support across the same-day network as it continues to ramp up.”
The building, with construction recently completed, is on Kibler (Aver 320) and Kelsey – north of the original Amazon building.
Banke offered this explanation:
“I was unfortunately given misinformation on the new HLA6 site in Visalia and have some corrected updates to share with you. Here is the correct information.
• Building Name: HLA6
• Building type: Same Day Distribution Center, supporting Same-Day facilities in the area up to 500 miles.
• Launch timing: Will launch sometime this month, but won’t be fully ramped up for another 6 months
• Jobs: We’re hiring for hundreds of full time and part time jobs at this site, with starting pay $15.50 an hour. Hiring will take place in phases (weekly) as shift schedules are released.
• This same day distribution center is just over 1 million square feet and both stores and distributes inventory to nearby same day fulfillment centers, up to a 500 mile radius.
• At first, HLA6 will first support same day fulfillment centers in Nevada, with plans to expand support across the same day network as it continues to ramp up.
• HLA6 is one of Amazon’s newer buildings, and this will be the third one in the entire country to launch. The other two are located in Atlanta and Pennsylvania.”
Banke’s original statement that this would be a same-day service center did not jibe with Amazon footprints of other same-day service centers that are much smaller typically.
The City says they still expect employment at Amazon’s second warehouse in Visalia to be around 500 and could grow as this regional distribution facility supplies more geographic areas.
Promising news
Visalia Economic Development Manager Devon Jones says “It is promising to learn that the new Amazon facility is 1 of only 3 such newer facilities in the entire country. I think that clearly demonstrates the unique and strategic characteristics of our location for such companies. So, it’s promising not only for the 500 new jobs expected from this center, but also because of the hundreds, and eventually thousands, of additional jobs that the other developments expected in the Visalia Industrial Park will bring as new tenants learn about Visalia. We’re very fortunate to have many active speculative industrial developers in Visalia such as CapRock, Diversified Development Group, YS Industries, Seefried, G4 and many others.”
By contrast to this distribution center, the existing 1.2 million sf Amazon, in service for more than a year, is a fulfillment center, meaning it ships products to end- use customers like you and me.
In the past few days Amazon announced that it is hiring 150,000 employees throughout the U.S. in full-time, seasonal, and part-time roles across its operations network for the holidays. A diverse range of roles—from packing and picking to sorting and shipping—are available to applicants from all backgrounds and experience levels.
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