Used plastic pallets in Philadelphia

Philadelphia's warehousing belt

Count the jobs the BLS can disclose in Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington and you reach 38,250 in warehousing and storage for 2025, 1.5% of the metro's private work. The area covers 11 counties: Burlington, Camden, Gloucester, Bucks, Chester, Montgomery....

Philadelphia against Pennsylvania

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

Where a Philadelphia lot lands: the busy ZIPs

Census ZIP Code Business Patterns for 2023 list 5 ZIPs here with the most warehousing establishments, 115 between them. 08102 (Camden) leads with 33, 29% of the listed total.

• 08102 Camden: 33 warehousing establishments, 1.3 times 19720.
• 19720 New Castle: 25 warehousing establishments, 76% of the count in 08102.
• 08085 Swedesboro: 23 warehousing establishments, 70% of the count in 08102.
• 08016 Burlington: 21 warehousing establishments, 64% of the count in 08102.
• 19007 Bristol: 13 warehousing establishments, 39% of the count in 08102.

What the ratios say

Hidden counties mean Philadelphia's figure of 38,250 is the disclosed part of its warehousing work, not a ceiling.

• Philadelphia ranks 8th of the 60 metros in the data by disclosed warehousing jobs, with 38,250 against a median of 13,652.
• Spread across 11 counties, that is 3,477 warehousing jobs per county on average.
• Burlington County holds 28% of the metro's jobs and Gloucester County 26%; the gap between them is 765 jobs.
• 08102 has 33 warehousing establishments, 2.5 times as many as 19007 (13) at the other end of the list.
• Pennsylvania has 123,481 warehousing jobs in all, so the disclosed counties of Philadelphia are 31% of the state.
• Warehousing is 1.5% 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 127,866 warehousing jobs along the route.
• The metros closest in size are Northern New Jersey (39,367, 1,117 above) and Columbus (34,200, 4,050 below).
• The top three ZIPs, 08102, 19720, 08085, hold 81 of the 115 establishments in the ZIP list, or 70%.
• The ZIP list spans 5 towns, led by Camden (33) and New Castle (25).
• The ZIP list averages 23.0 warehousing establishments per ZIP across 5 ZIPs, and the quietest, 19007 Bristol, has 13.
• Of the 11 counties in the metro, the BLS discloses 3 for warehousing, which together account for 25,332 of the 38,250 jobs counted.
• Philadelphia has 2.8 times the disclosed warehousing jobs of the median metro.
• For every warehousing job in these counties there are about 66 other private jobs, so pallet-using work is spread thinly across 11 counties.

Where Philadelphia ranks

Philadelphia and the 7 metros above it hold 42% of the 1,116,650 warehousing jobs across the 60 metros in the data. The largest, Inland Empire, counts 118,368.

The roads a lot travels in Philadelphia

Interstate 95 is the Interstate in our data that serves Philadelphia.

Neighbouring metros in the data

Metros that share a corridor with Philadelphia, and the other metros in Pennsylvania, with their disclosed warehousing jobs.

The ladder around Philadelphia

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

Local industries that use pallets

Against the national share of employment, pharmaceutical and medicine manufacturing is the most concentrated pallet-using line in Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, at 2.3x. Pharma shippers want pallets they can sanitise, with papers on resin and colour; some prefer polypropylene because it takes sterilisation.

• Pharmaceutical and medicine manufacturing: 15,593 jobs in the disclosed counties, 4.4% of the 350,886 across the US, or 0.41 for every warehousing job here.
• Chemical manufacturing: 28,734 jobs in the disclosed counties, 3.2% of the 892,426 across the US, or 0.75 for every warehousing job here.

Comparing two lots fairly

• Use the same footprint for both, measured in the same units.
• Compare grade by wear, not by the seller's letter.
• Count makers present in each, since fewer makers means a more uniform lot.
• Compare the share of repaired pieces, and where the repairs sit.
• Set freight, timing and handling beside the wear, rather than in place of it.

Requesting a lot for Philadelphia

• Footprint: 48 x 40 in or a square footprint
• Grade: like new
• Dock ZIP, for example 08102 or 19720
• Quantity band

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