Area media, community members tour N. Jackson Amazon facility

By SAMANTHA PHILLIPS

sphillips@vindy.com

NORTH JACKSON

The new Amazon delivery station at Debartolo Drive employs about 200 part- and full-time associates and will be hiring more warehouse employees and delivery van drivers.

Amazon spokesmen gave a tour of the 43,000-square-foot station, which officially began operating at the start of June, to area media and community members Tuesday afternoon.

“We look for a great workforce, a community that is welcoming – and we want to be close to our customers,” said Sean Healy, regional operation director for Amazon Logistics. “The customer demand here is strong, and we want to get packages to them as quickly as possible.”

The facility is hiring seasonal associates and leadership positions. Pay starts at $15 an hour, and there are varying benefit packages for both part- and full-time positions.

The facility is what Amazon calls a last-mile delivery station. When a customer orders a package, it is first delivered to a larger fulfillment center, such as the one in Columbus, and then it is delivered to a station such as this, where either a warehouse driver or Amazon Flex driver will take the package to the correct address.

Healy said the station increases Amazon’s capacity and flexibility to meet increasing customer demands in the area.

Amazon Logistics uses an algorithm that can assess the fastest route for a package to be delivered and uses a labeling system that enables associates to package and send out shipments efficiently.

There are opportunities available to join Amazon’s Delivery Service Partner program and Amazon Flex, which allows drivers to deliver packages as independent contractors.

As of next month, there will be six of those partnerships locally.

Thomas Lynch of Cortland, head of one of those partnerships, Smile Logistics, said he started out with one employee, and now has 52. Some of those employees are former General Motors workers, he said.

At the end of the tour, the spokesmen gifted the Boys & Girls Club of Youngstown with $10,000 worth of science, technology, engineering and math equipment, including iPads, coding systems, microscopes and 3D printers.