In just the past seven days, Wal-Mart employees moved nearly 360,000 cases of food into the company's new distribution center east of Sparks as they got ready to begin full-blown operations this week.
That's a lot of freight, but the distribution center could hit dramatically higher numbers in coming months as it grows into its role as one of the company's first high-velocity grocery distribution centers.
At peak periods, about 390,000 cases a day a day will be moving through the 915,564-square-foot facility at Tahoe Reno Industrial Center, says General Manager Darius Pique.
The warehouse is nearly as big as the entire Meadowood Mall.
Twenty football fields could fit inside it.
It's nearly a mile walk around its perimeter.
And, more to the point, the building will store 3 million cases of food including frozen and refrigerated items during normal operations.
Some of the inventory will be moving so fast that it will barely touch the distribution center floor.
Employees will simply move it from an incoming freight carrier to an outgoing Wal-Mart truck.
The center, serving 72 Wal-Mart stores in Nevada and California, handles only the fast-moving grocery items at Wal-Mart groceries.
Slower-moving inventory spices, for instance will continue to be delivered from existing distribution centers in Utah and Washington State, says Pique.
The distribution center ultimately may serve as many as 110 Wal-Mart SuperCenters in the region.
With that growth, the company projects that its employment of 535 when the center begins shipping this week will grow to about 625 in November.
By the end of 2007, employment is expected to grow to 780 with a maximum staff of 900 workers by the middle of 2008.
Wal-Mart has been picky about its hiring.
It received 7,000 applications in recent months and interviewed 3,000 candidates to select its first 535 workers, said Johnny Jarolik, assistant general manager of the facility.
Pique said Wal-Mart executives were happy to find a deep pool of experienced warehouse and distribution workers in the area and said their experience in fast and accurate distribution work is likely to provide a competitive advantage for the company.
The center's management team of 46, meanwhile, was recruited from Wal-Mart distribution centers as well as other employers.
The center is the 130th distribution center operated by Wal-Mart in the United States, and it's the company's 39th warehouse to handle grocery items.
The growth of the grocery warehouses Wal-Mart opened its first only 13 years ago is a commentary on the company's fast entry into the grocery business.
