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Amazon To Build Fulfillment Centers In Park City, Kansas City

Stock Catalog, flickr Creative Commons

Amazon is planning to build two fulfillment centers in Kansas, including one in Park City, just north of Wichita.

Seattle-based Amazon said Friday that the centers combined will create 1,000 jobs with a minimum starting salary of $15 an hour. The other center will be in Kansas City, Kansas.

“Today’s Amazon announcement further proves why Kansas can offer prospective businesses the kind of workforce, infrastructure, and central location that can compete with anywhere in the country,” Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly said in a statement.

She was joined by local and state officials on a Zoom call Friday morning announcing the project.

Work already has begun on the 1 million-square-foot warehouse near 71st Street North and Broadway in Park City. Both facilities are expected to open next year.

Park City assistant city administrator Dana Walden says Amazon is building the facilities without any tax breaks.

"They're coming to us without asking for any incentives, which is a win-win situation for sure,” she said.

Employees in the new warehouses will pack and ship bulky or larger-sized items, such as patio furniture, outdoor equipment or rugs, the company said.

Amazon is an e-commerce giant that had about $280 billion dollars in revenue last year. It has close to 1 million employees worldwide.

Amazon operates more than 110 fulfillment centers across North America. It already has one in Kansas City, Kansas, as well as in Lenexa and Edgerton. 

Since 2010, the company says it has created more than 4,500 jobs in Kansas and invested more than $2.9 billion in infrastructure and employee compensation. It closed a fulfillment center in Coffeyville in 2015.

“We’re excited to continue our growth and investment across Kansas so we can better serve our customers throughout the state,” Alicia Boler Davis, Amazon’s vice president of global customer fulfillment, said in a statement. “We are grateful for the strong support we’ve received from local and state leaders, and we look forward to ingraining ourselves in the communities in which we serve.”

Amazon also recently selected a Wichita site for another distribution center. That 140,000-square-foot delivery station opens later this year.

Copyright 2020 KMUW | NPR for Wichita

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