Oklahoma’s strategic location in central USA is facilitating continued growth of its logistics/distribution cluster despite Covid

The state of Oklahoma is at the center of it all...literally, and it’s this central location within the continental United States that continues to attract companies seeking to establish a logistics/distribution center/back office to facilitate transportation of their products to end customers across the country.

Despite COVID, 2020 has been a busy year in terms of logistic/distribution investments in Oklahoma.

Most recently, in December 2020 Amazon announced plans to establish a new one-million-square foot fulfillment center in Oklahoma City. Anticipated to launch in 2021 the facility will create 500 full-time jobs

Earlier this year Milo’s Tea Company, Costco Wholesale Corporation and Dollar General also announced plans to invest in the state:
“We started shipping product from our Tulsa facility end of September, and we are already seeing Tulsa’s family-centric community, innovative workforce programs and central distribution point making a difference in our expansion and ability to deliver more Milo’s Moment,” said Milo’s Chief Executive Officer, Tricia Wallwork.

• Milo’s Tea Company : In late September 2020, the Birmingham-Alabama based company, known for manufacturing, distributing and selling fresh-brewed, all-natural teas and lemonade throughout the United States, opened a production and distribution facility at the Cherokee Extension Industrial Park in Tulsa County. Milo’s announced its expansion to Tulsa in May 2019 where it invested over $60 million in advanced manufacturing equipment and construction of an operations center spanning more than 100,000 square feet on the 20-acre site. In its first phase of hiring Milo’s added 60 new jobs and plans to add more than 100 direct jobs over the next 12 months.

According to the Tulsa Regional Chamber, the total economic impact of the expansion in Tulsa County means the 110 direct jobs at Milo’s will support an additional 177 indirect jobs in the community. Together, these jobs will provide $16.4 million in earned income annually. During the construction phase, the capital investment of over $60 million supported an additional $35.5 million in income earned by construction and supply vendors.
These three corporate investments follow a long list of nationally recognized companies that have established logistic/distribution operations in Oklahoma. These include:
With 3 inland ports, 140 public-use airports, 3,850 miles of rail and 12,000 miles of highway, Oklahoma is America’s hub. Equidistant between New York, Los Angeles, Mexico City and Canada, the state’s central location offers companies streamlined connections to more than 88 million people within a 500-mile radius. Numerous shovel-ready sites can be found throughout the state such as the BNSF Logistics Center in Oklahoma City, a 195-acre site that offers mainline turnouts, industry common track and inner roads – all full-permitted.

• Costco selected Oklahoma City in August 2020 for its new back office operations to support its travel and e-commerce business units. The site will create 1,044 new jobs over the next three years with an average wage of $59,740, with an expected capital investment of $25 million. Being in a Central Time Zone allows the center to easily cater to client needs across the entire nation.
• Dollar General: In August 2020, the company announced the expansion of its distribution center in Ardmore, Ok, with the addition of its 160,000 square foot DG Fresh facility. Once completed in 2021 the Dollar General campus at the Ardmore Municipal Airpark will contain over 1,450,000 square feet of distribution space, employ 800 workers and serve as the central distribution point to supply its nearly 17,000 stores across the nation.

• Amazon: In mid-2019 the company established a 640,000-squre-foot fulfillment center in Oklahoma City as well as a four-story, roughly 2.5-million-square foot fulfillment center in Tulsa. Since 2010, Amazon has created more than 4,000 jobs in Oklahoma and invested more than $650 million across the state.
• Macy’s: The company opened its largest direct-to-consumer fulfillment center in Owasso, OK in 2015 to process online orders for customers in central and southern regions of the United States. The 1.3 million-square-foot facility employs approximately 1,500 full- and part-time associated year-round, another 1,000 or more temporary seasonal associated are hired each year to handle larger volume of online orders from customers during the holiday shopping season.