Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

Inbound

Amazon’s DC footprint by the numbers

Report looks at just how much warehouse square footage Amazon owns.

Who would have guessed that when Amazon opened its first fulfillment center in 1997, it would be the beginning of a full-blown warehousing empire? Today, the Seattle-based e-tailer—which itself has morphed from a simple bookseller into a purveyor of, well, just about everything—operates hundreds of warehouses across the U.S. that collectively total approximately 319 million square feet of space, according to a report from Big Rentz, an online construction-equipment rental network

The retailer’s reach is so great that as of 2021, there were only five states (Alaska, Hawaii, Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont) that lacked a large-scale Amazon warehouse, Big Rentz said. It noted, however, that while those states may not have a full-sized DC within their borders, Amazon nonetheless has a smaller presence in each state. At the other end of the scale, the state with the most Amazon warehouses is California, which had 35 current or planned facilities as of 2021. 


These aren’t small-time operations. The average fulfillment center has a footprint of about 800,000 square feet, nearly the size of the 830,000-square-foot Buckingham Palace, the report said. And some run much bigger than that. For example, the biggest single Amazon DC as of September 2021 was a former General Motors assembly plant in Wilmington, Delaware, coming in at 3.8 million square feet, Big Rentz said. The facility has a footprint of just 640,000 square feet but rises five stories high, giving it enough space to fit 66.6 football fields inside. Within those walls, the plant hosts about 3,500 workers and 40,000 robots that collaborate to retrieve, inventory, and store merchandise, the report said.

The Latest

More Stories

team collaborating on data with laptops

Gartner: data governance strategy is key to making AI pay off

Supply chain planning (SCP) leaders working on transformation efforts are focused on two major high-impact technology trends, including composite AI and supply chain data governance, according to a study from Gartner, Inc.

"SCP leaders are in the process of developing transformation roadmaps that will prioritize delivering on advanced decision intelligence and automated decision making," Eva Dawkins, Director Analyst in Gartner’s Supply Chain practice, said in a release. "Composite AI, which is the combined application of different AI techniques to improve learning efficiency, will drive the optimization and automation of many planning activities at scale, while supply chain data governance is the foundational key for digital transformation.”

Keep ReadingShow less

Featured

manufacturing job growth in US factories

Savills “cautiously optimistic” on future of U.S. manufacturing boom

The U.S. manufacturing sector has become an engine of new job creation over the past four years, thanks to a combination of federal incentives and mega-trends like nearshoring and the clean energy boom, according to the industrial real estate firm Savills.

While those manufacturing announcements have softened slightly from their 2022 high point, they remain historically elevated. And the sector’s growth outlook remains strong, regardless of the results of the November U.S. presidential election, the company said in its September “Savills Manufacturing Report.”

Keep ReadingShow less
dexory robot counting warehouse inventory

Dexory raises $80 million for inventory-counting robots

The British logistics robot vendor Dexory this week said it has raised $80 million in venture funding to support an expansion of its artificial intelligence (AI) powered features, grow its global team, and accelerate the deployment of its autonomous robots.

A “significant focus” continues to be on expanding across the U.S. market, where Dexory is live with customers in seven states and last month opened a U.S. headquarters in Nashville. The Series B will also enhance development and production facilities at its UK headquarters, the firm said.

Keep ReadingShow less
container cranes and trucks at DB Schenker yard

Deutsche Bahn says sale of DB Schenker will cut debt, improve rail

German rail giant Deutsche Bahn AG yesterday said it will cut its debt and boost its focus on improving rail infrastructure thanks to its formal approval of the deal to sell its logistics subsidiary DB Schenker to the Danish transport and logistics group DSV for a total price of $16.3 billion.

Originally announced in September, the move will allow Deutsche Bahn to “fully focus on restructuring the rail infrastructure in Germany and providing climate-friendly passenger and freight transport operations in Germany and Europe,” Werner Gatzer, Chairman of the DB Supervisory Board, said in a release.

Keep ReadingShow less
containers stacked in a yard

Reinke moves from TIA to IANA in top office

Transportation industry veteran Anne Reinke will become president & CEO of trade group the Intermodal Association of North America (IANA) at the end of the year, stepping into the position from her previous post leading third party logistics (3PL) trade group the Transportation Intermediaries Association (TIA), both organizations said today.

Reinke will take her new job upon the retirement of Joni Casey at the end of the year. Casey had announced in July that she would step down after 27 years at the helm of IANA.

Keep ReadingShow less