Used plastic pallets in Seattle-Tacoma

Seattle-Tacoma's warehousing belt

Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue spans 3 counties (Snohomish, King, Pierce). In the counties where the Bureau of Labor Statistics can publish, private employers had 23,062 warehousing and storage jobs in 2025, 1.3% of local private jobs.

Seattle-Tacoma against Washington

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

Where a Seattle-Tacoma lot lands: the busy ZIPs

Census ZIP Code Business Patterns for 2023 list 5 ZIPs here with the most warehousing establishments, 131 between them. 98032 (Kent) leads with 41, 31% of the listed total.

• 98032 Kent: 41 warehousing establishments, 1.2 times 98390.
• 98390 Sumner: 33 warehousing establishments, 80% of the count in 98032.
• 98001 Auburn: 23 warehousing establishments, 56% of the count in 98032.
• 98421 Tacoma: 19 warehousing establishments, 46% of the count in 98032.
• 98424 Fife: 15 warehousing establishments, 37% of the count in 98032.

What the ratios say

Hidden counties mean Seattle-Tacoma's figure of 23,062 is the disclosed part of its warehousing work, not a ceiling.

• Seattle-Tacoma ranks 16th of the 60 metros in the data by disclosed warehousing jobs, with 23,062 against a median of 13,652.
• Spread across 3 counties, that is 7,687 warehousing jobs per county on average.
• Pierce County holds 45% of the metro's jobs and King County 41%; the gap between them is 982 jobs.
• 98032 has 41 warehousing establishments, 2.7 times as many as 98424 (15) at the other end of the list.
• Washington has 36,691 warehousing jobs in all, so the disclosed counties of Seattle-Tacoma are 63% of the state.
• Warehousing is 1.3% 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 86,962 warehousing jobs along the route.
• The metros closest in size are Los Angeles (27,225, 4,163 above) and Miami (22,104, 958 below).
• The top three ZIPs, 98032, 98390, 98001, hold 97 of the 131 establishments in the ZIP list, or 74%.
• The ZIP list spans 5 towns, led by Kent (41) and Sumner (33).
• The ZIP list averages 26.2 warehousing establishments per ZIP across 5 ZIPs, and the quietest, 98424 Fife, has 15.
• Of the 3 counties in the metro, the BLS discloses 3 for warehousing, which together account for 23,062 of the 23,062 jobs counted.
• Seattle-Tacoma has 1.7 times the disclosed warehousing jobs of the median metro.
• For every warehousing job in these counties there are about 76 other private jobs, so pallet-using work is spread thinly across 3 counties.

Where Seattle-Tacoma ranks

Seattle-Tacoma and the 15 metros above it hold 63% 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 Seattle-Tacoma

Interstate 5 is the Interstate in our data that serves Seattle-Tacoma.

Other metros nearby

Metros that share a corridor with Seattle-Tacoma, and the other metros in Washington, with their disclosed warehousing jobs.

The ladder around Seattle-Tacoma

Metros ranked by disclosed warehousing jobs: Seattle-Tacoma with the two above it and the two below.

Local industries that use pallets

Against the national share of employment, warehousing and storage is the most concentrated pallet-using line in Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, at 0.9x. Warehouses with automated storage need a consistent size for conveyors and a rack rating they can read.

• Warehousing and storage: 23,062 jobs in the disclosed counties, 1.2% of the 1,901,976 across the US, or 1.00 for every warehousing job here.
• Food manufacturing: 15,003 jobs in the disclosed counties, 0.8% of the 1,775,008 across the US, or 0.65 for every warehousing job here.

Sorting a lot into piles

• Pile one: whole pallets with flat decks, square corners and no repairs.
• Pile two: whole pallets with a repair or a mismatched piece, kept separate and counted.
• Pile three: pallets with a crack through a load path, set aside for repair or scrap.
• Pile four: marked pallets that may belong to someone else, held until the owner is known.
• Write the pile count on a board by the stacks, and photograph it each morning.

What to send for a Seattle-Tacoma lot

• Footprint: 48 x 40 in, one maker
• Grade: used and clean with a stated rating
• Dock ZIP, for example 98032 or 98390
• Quantity band

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