Used plastic pallets in New Orleans

New Orleans's warehousing belt

New Orleans-Metairie spans 7 counties (Jefferson, Orleans, Plaquemines, St. Bernard, St. Charles, St. James...). In the counties where the Bureau of Labor Statistics can publish, private employers had 2,090 warehousing and storage jobs in 2025, 0.5% of local private jobs.

New Orleans against Louisiana

The metro's disclosed-county total set beside the state's whole count, so the two can be read together.

Where a New Orleans lot lands: the busy ZIPs

Census ZIP Code Business Patterns for 2023 list 5 ZIPs here with the most warehousing establishments, 33 between them. 70121 (New Orleans) leads with 9, 27% of the listed total.

• 70121 New Orleans: 9 warehousing establishments, 1.1 times 70123.
• 70123 New Orleans: 8 warehousing establishments, 89% of the count in 70121.
• 70001 Metairie: 8 warehousing establishments, 89% of the count in 70121.
• 70126 New Orleans: 4 warehousing establishments, 44% of the count in 70121.
• 70115 New Orleans: 4 warehousing establishments, 44% of the count in 70121.

What the ratios say

Hidden counties mean New Orleans's figure of 2,090 is the disclosed part of its warehousing work, not a ceiling.

• New Orleans ranks 53rd of the 60 metros in the data by disclosed warehousing jobs, with 2,090 against a median of 13,652.
• Spread across 7 counties, that is 299 warehousing jobs per county on average.
• Jefferson County holds 55% of the metro's jobs and Orleans County 33%; the gap between them is 468 jobs.
• 70121 has 9 warehousing establishments, 2.3 times as many as 70115 (4) at the other end of the list.
• Louisiana has 15,312 warehousing jobs in all, so the disclosed counties of New Orleans are 14% of the state.
• Warehousing is 0.5% of private jobs in these counties; where it is higher than average, pallets are a daily cost and sellers of surplus are common.
• One Interstate in the data serves the metro, and it carries 255,943 warehousing jobs along the route.
• The metros closest in size are Sioux Falls (2,930, 840 above) and Laredo (2,014, 76 below).
• The top three ZIPs, 70121, 70123, 70001, hold 25 of the 33 establishments in the ZIP list, or 76%.
• The ZIP list spans 2 towns, led by New Orleans (25) and Metairie (8).
• The ZIP list averages 6.6 warehousing establishments per ZIP across 5 ZIPs, and the quietest, 70115 New Orleans, has 4.
• Of the 7 counties in the metro, the BLS discloses 2 for warehousing, which together account for 1,828 of the 2,090 jobs counted.
• Reaching the median metro would take 6.5 times the disclosed warehousing jobs New Orleans has now.
• For every warehousing job in these counties there are about 199 other private jobs, so pallet-using work is spread thinly across 7 counties.

Where New Orleans ranks

New Orleans is one of the 8 smallest of the 60 metros by disclosed warehousing jobs. The largest, Inland Empire, counts 118,368, which is 57 times as many.

The roads a lot travels in New Orleans

Interstate 10 is the Interstate in our data that serves New Orleans.

Other metros nearby

Metros that share a corridor with New Orleans, and the other metros in Louisiana, with their disclosed warehousing jobs.

The ladder around New Orleans

Metros ranked by disclosed warehousing jobs: New Orleans with the two above it and the two below.

Local industries that use pallets

Against the national share of employment, chemical manufacturing is the most concentrated pallet-using line in New Orleans-Metairie, at 1.9x. Drums and bags drive the footprint here: four 55-gallon drums sit on a 48 x 48 without overhang, and 45 x 45 is the CP9 chemical standard.

• Chemical manufacturing: 4,936 jobs in the disclosed counties, 0.6% of the 892,426 across the US, or 2.36 for every warehousing job here.
• Food manufacturing: 3,516 jobs in the disclosed counties, 0.2% of the 1,775,008 across the US, or 1.68 for every warehousing job here.

When something looks wrong

• Stop unloading and photograph the fault before anything moves.
• Count how many pallets show the same fault, to see if it is a lot problem or a one-off.
• Tell the desk or the seller in writing the same day, with the photographs attached.
• Hold the affected stacks apart until you hear back.
• Keep one sample pallet unused, so the maker or an inspector can examine it.

Storing a lot properly

• Keep stacks on a flat, dry slab, away from heaters, doorways and loading-bay draughts.
• Limit stack height to what the bottom pallet and the lift truck can safely manage.
• Shield pallets from sunlight with a tarp or a roof, since ultraviolet light chalks and embrittles some resins.
• Separate footprints, makers and grades with floor markings so pickers never guess.
• Leave an aisle wide enough for a fork truck to turn without clipping a corner.

What to send for a New Orleans lot

• Footprint: 48 x 48 in or 45 x 45 in
• Grade: used and clean
• Dock ZIP, for example 70121 or 70123
• Quantity band

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