Amazon Announces Plans to Expand in Pennsylvania; New Pittsburgh Fulfillment Center Will Create More Than 800 Full-Time Jobs

SEATTLE–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Jul. 30, 2019– Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) today announced plans to open its 15^th Pennsylvanian operations facility in Pittsburgh, creating more than 800 new, full-time jobs starting at $15 an hour with comprehensive benefits and opportunities in an industry-leading workplace.

“Pennsylvania is a great state for business and Amazon is excited to continue its growth and investment with our newest fulfillment center in Allegheny County,” said Alicia Boler Davis, vice president of global customer fulfillment, Amazon. “For nearly a decade, the Keystone state has been key to Amazon’s ability to serve our incredible customers and provide great selection and super-fast shipping speeds across the Northeast and Midwest regions of the U.S. Since 2010, the company has invested more than $8.5 billion in the state through its local fulfillment center and cloud infrastructure, research facilities, and compensation to thousands of employees. We are excited to create more than 800 new full-time jobs, in addition to the 10,000 current employees across the state, who receive industry-leading pay and benefits starting on day one.”

“It’s a great win any time a business comes in and pledges to create 800 new jobs,” said Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf. “This is a significant investment for Pennsylvania and I applaud Amazon for selecting our commonwealth as the location for this facility.”

The fulfillment center will be more than 1 million square feet and Amazonemployees will pick, pack and ship larger customer items, such as sports equipment, patio furniture, kayaks and larger home goods. All associates will go through hours of safety training and ongoing coaching and will have access to continuing education opportunities through Amazon’s upskilling programs, such as Career Choice, in which the company will pre-pay up to 95 percent of tuition for courses related to in-demand fields, regardless of whether the skills are relevant to a career at Amazon. Since the program’s launch, more than 25,000 employees have pursued degrees in game design and visual communications, nursing, IT programming and radiology, to name a few.

On top of Amazon’s $15 minimum wage, the company offers full-time employees comprehensive benefits including full medical, vision, and dental insurance as well as a 401(k) with 50 percent match starting on day one. The company also offers up to 20 weeks of maternal and parental paid leave and innovative benefits such as Leave Share and Ramp Back, which give new parents flexibility with their growing families. In addition, Amazon has pledged to invest over $700 million to provide upskilling training for 100,000 U.S. employees for in demand jobs. Programs will help Amazonians from all backgrounds access training to move into highly skilled roles across the company’s corporate offices, tech hubs, fulfillment centers, retails stores, and transportation network, or pursue career paths outside of Amazon.

“Today’s announcement underscores that Amazon has never taken its eyes off Pittsburgh. A new, from-the-ground-up fulfillment center will increase the count of several local Amazon facilities – including a growing engineering center – that provide, or will provide, thousands of well-paying jobs in the region,” said Pittsburgh Regional Alliance (PRA) President Mark A. Thomas. “The PRA – the economic development marketing affiliate of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development – was happy to bring together a number of partners to showcase the Pittsburgh assets that support the company’s expansion plans. These include proven strength in distribution and logistics, pad-ready parcels with nearby interstate and highway access and a workforce pipeline that meets the hiring demands of enterprises, like Amazon, on the leading edge of innovation.”

“This is great news for our region. We appreciate the ongoing partnership with Amazon that began years ago. Their continued expansion in this region is more evidence that the ecodistrict of logistics, warehouse and manufacturing in the airport corridor is starting to gain momentum,” said County Executive Rich Fitzgerald, Allegheny County. “Amazon’s decision also reflects their continued confidence in this county’s, this region’s and this state’s economy. The county, Port Authority and Airport Authority are proud to continue working with so many partners to show that this region is a good place to do business.”

An addition to Amazon’s presence in Pennsylvania means more than just the great jobs with full benefits provided within the fulfillment center’s four walls. Each additional Amazon facility adds to the thousands of jobs in construction and services the company has brought to Pennsylvania. Since 2010, Amazonhas invested more than $8.5 billion in the state through its customer fulfillment and cloud infrastructure and compensation to its employees. Using the methodology developed by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, Amazonestimates its investments in the state have created an additional 8,000 indirect jobs on top of the company’s direct hires.

Amazon’s fulfillment network supports millions of businesses of all sizes worldwide through its Fulfillment By Amazon offering, and many of those local organizations are based right here in Pennsylvania. There are more than 68,500 authors, small and medium-sized businesses, and developers in Pennsylvaniagrowing their companies and reaching new customers on Amazon products and services.

About Amazon

Amazon is guided by four principles: customer obsession rather than competitor focus, passion for invention, commitment to operational excellence, and long-term thinking. Customer reviews, 1-Click shopping, personalized recommendations, Prime, Fulfillment by Amazon, AWS, Kindle Direct Publishing, Kindle, Fire tablets, Fire TV, Amazon Echo, and Alexa are some of the products and services pioneered by Amazon. For more information, visit amazon.com/about and follow @AmazonNews.