Amazon.com Inc. has revealed just how busy the company was over the holiday shopping season, and the impact it had on southeastern Wisconsin.
The global online retailer’s Kenosha fulfillment center, for example, shipped almost 1 million items per day for three days straight.
Overall, Amazon shipped more than 1 billion items worldwide through Prime and Fulfillment by Amazon, a record for the company. Its workforce ballooned to 200,000 employees to keep up with the record-breaking demand. More than 1,000 seasonal employees were hired in Kenosha to meet its holiday rush.
In the past two years, Amazon has opened more than 12 new facilities. About 20 of its fulfillment centers include robotic technology, with 45,000 robotic units helping employees complete shipments.
Amazon has more than 4,000 full-time employees at its massive, 1.1 million-square-foot fulfillment center and 500,000-square-foot distribution center in Kenosha, which opened in June 2015. In April, the mega-retailer launched same-day delivery in Milwaukee.
Amazon, which prides itself on delivering orders quickly—sometimes the same day—said Dec. 19 was the peak worldwide shipping day, and that the last order delivered in time for Christmas was ordered at 10:23 a.m. on Dec. 24 and was delivered in Richmond, Virginia at 2:32 p.m. that same day.
During the holiday shopping season, the Amazon Kenosha fulfillment center also donated $5,000 and more than 95 pallets of supplies to the Shalom Center in Kenosha to help provide food, shelter, housing and support to the area’s homeless and low-income population.
