Amazon is expanding part of its Florida operation this month, adding more jobs to its Ruskin location outside of Tampa.
Gov. Rick Scott will head to Amazon’s Ruskin fulfillment center Wednesday to talk about Amazon’s expansion in the Sunshine State.
Amazon first announced it would be breaking ground in Florida in 2013, when the company announced it would build distribution centers in Hillsborough County and in Lakeland, expecting to create more than 1,000 jobs.
The Ruskin location was the first to open in 2014 while the Lakeland center opened up late last year.
The two locations are Amazon’s only fulfillment centers in the state.
The two centers, which are around 1 million square feet each, give Florida buyers a quicker turnaround time, offering some items with same-day delivery options since the fulfillment centers are nearby.
When the centers were first announced, Gov. Rick Scott’s office said Amazon was planning to add more than 3,000 full-time jobs that would add more than $300 million in investments into Florida’s economy by the end of 2016.
In August, Amazon announced it would be hiring 2,000 people to work at its two fulfillment centers in Ruskin and Lakeland. Interest in the jobs has been high -- according to a Tampa Bay Times article detailing a job fair for Amazon’s Ruskin location, thousands spent hours in line just to apply for jobs at the fulfillment center at the Hillsborough Community College SouthShore campus.
The jobs, Amazon said, will pay around 30 percent more of the average retail salary, a boost to the economy of Tampa Bay.
In October, the online retailer, which made over $107 billion in revenue last year, hosted another job fair in the Tampa area, offering to give jobs “on the spot” to candidates who applied to work there.
Jobs at the fulfillment center cover a variety of tasks, including packing and shipping customer orders and picking up orders. Amazon employees enjoy a wide range of benefits like health insurance, a 401(k) program with a 50 percent match and stock rewards as soon as they start working.
Working at Amazon also has perks for students, too. The company offers to prepay 95 percent of tuition for courses for in-demand career fields, even if the courses aren’t related to any jobs at Amazon.
Gov. Scott will hold a press conference to discuss the new jobs at 10:30 a.m.
