Used plastic pallets in Columbus

Columbus by county

Count the jobs the BLS can disclose in Columbus and you reach 34,200 in warehousing and storage for 2025, 3.6% of the metro's private work. The area covers 10 counties: Delaware, Fairfield, Franklin, Hocking, Licking, Madison....

Columbus against Ohio

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

ZIPs with the most warehouses

Census ZIP Code Business Patterns for 2023 list 5 ZIPs here with the most warehousing establishments, 150 between them. 43137 (Lockbourne) leads with 39, 26% of the listed total.

• 43137 Lockbourne: 39 warehousing establishments, 1.1 times 43125.
• 43125 Groveport: 37 warehousing establishments, 95% of the count in 43137.
• 43228 Columbus: 28 warehousing establishments, 72% of the count in 43137.
• 43207 Columbus: 24 warehousing establishments, 62% of the count in 43137.
• 43123 Grove City: 22 warehousing establishments, 56% of the count in 43137.

What the ratios say

The BLS leaves out counties where one employer would show through, so the 34,200 jobs counted for Columbus may understate the metro.

• Columbus ranks 9th of the 60 metros in the data by disclosed warehousing jobs, with 34,200 against a median of 13,652.
• Spread across 10 counties, that is 3,420 warehousing jobs per county on average.
• Franklin County holds 53% of the metro's jobs and Madison County 22%; the gap between them is 10,699 jobs.
• 43137 has 39 warehousing establishments, 1.8 times as many as 43123 (22) at the other end of the list.
• Ohio has 98,354 warehousing jobs in all, so the disclosed counties of Columbus are 35% of the state.
• Warehousing is 3.6% of private jobs in these counties; where it is higher than average, pallets are a daily cost and sellers of surplus are common.
• The metros closest in size are Philadelphia (38,250, 4,050 above) and Houston (33,785, 415 below).
• The top three ZIPs, 43137, 43125, 43228, hold 104 of the 150 establishments in the ZIP list, or 69%.
• The ZIP list spans 4 towns, led by Columbus (52) and Lockbourne (39).
• The ZIP list averages 30.0 warehousing establishments per ZIP across 5 ZIPs, and the quietest, 43123 Grove City, has 22.
• Of the 10 counties in the metro, the BLS discloses 3 for warehousing, which together account for 32,303 of the 34,200 jobs counted.
• Columbus has 2.5 times the disclosed warehousing jobs of the median metro.
• For every warehousing job in these counties there are about 27 other private jobs, so pallet-using work is spread thinly across 10 counties.

Where Columbus ranks

Columbus and the 8 metros above it hold 45% of the 1,116,650 warehousing jobs across the 60 metros in the data. The largest, Inland Empire, counts 118,368.

Corridors through Columbus

No Interstate corridor in our data lists Columbus, so the county and ZIP figures carry this page.

The ladder around Columbus

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

Columbus's pallet-using trades

Against the national share of employment, dairy product manufacturing is the most concentrated pallet-using line in Columbus, at 2.7x. Dairy runs cold and wet, so ask about cold-room use and drainage in the deck.

• Dairy product manufacturing: 3,229 jobs in the disclosed counties, 1.9% of the 168,222 across the US, or 0.09 for every warehousing job here.
• Warehousing and storage: 34,200 jobs in the disclosed counties, 1.8% of the 1,901,976 across the US, or 1.00 for every warehousing job here.
• Beverage manufacturing: 3,154 jobs in the disclosed counties, 1.0% of the 316,938 across the US, or 0.09 for every warehousing job here.

Labelling stacks

• Put a card on each stack with footprint, grade and the date it was sorted.
• Use one colour of tape for repaired pallets and another for held ones.
• Keep labels at fork-truck eye level, not on the lowest pallet.
• Update the card when a pallet is removed, so the count stays true.
• Retire old cards instead of writing over them.

What to write down about a lot

• Footprint in both units, with the readings you took rather than the label.
• Number of stacks, pallets per stack and any odd stacks left over.
• Makers and model numbers seen on plates or moulded into the ribs.
• Count of repaired, mismatched or cracked pieces, and where each sits.
• Marks, colours and any smell, with a note on who confirmed each.

Requesting a lot for Columbus

• Footprint: 48 x 40 in or 56 x 44 in
• Grade: like new
• Dock ZIP, for example 43137 or 43125
• Quantity band

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