The old Michigan State Fairgrounds in Detroit is now officially home to the newest, biggest and most advanced Amazon Fulfillment Center in the state.
The gargantuan warehouse, located just off 8 Mile near Woodward Avenue, contains five floors and 3.8 million square feet of space. It employs more than 1,200 people — the majority of them Detroit residents.
Amazon says the building is slightly larger in size than their Fulfillment Center at the former Pontiac Silverdome site, which was previously the biggest in Michigan.
The Detroit center showcases Amazon's latest robotics technology, with the total amount of conveyance across all five floors of the building stretching to over 17 miles.
Construction began in late 2020 and the building opened for initial operations this April. The opening occurred several months later than originally planned, which an Amazon official said was due to the COVID-19 pandemic and supply-chain issues.
The Fulfillment Center is now ready for 24/7 operations, spread across four work shifts. It is Amazon's sixth Fulfillment Center in Michigan and the first Amazon package facility of any kind in Detroit.
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Early on, Amazon had publicly committed to hiring 1,200 people to work at the Detroit site.
During the center's ribbon-cutting event Wednesday, Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan announced that Amazon has met and exceeded that commitment: 1,279 workers have signed on, with 60% of them Detroit residents.
The average hourly wage at the center is $19 per hour, which Amazon says is in line with its national average for pay.
An unspecified number of the new Fulfillment Center's workers transferred over from other Amazon facilities in the region.
"Some of those transfers were waiting specifically on this building to open, because their commute was so much closer to come here," said Paola Lopez, site leader for the new Detroit center.
The Fulfillment Center's workforce is expected to grow this year, especially as the holiday season approaches. Although now second to Detroit for sheer size, the Pontiac's Fulfillment Center still employs more people, at over 3,000.
During Wednesday's event, Duggan recalled how he turned down Amazon's initial proposal for the Fulfillment Center. Under that early plan, the center would have employed about the same number of workers but taken up more acreage, leaving little space at the fairgrounds for any other developments.
Amazon ultimately agreed to design the Fulfillment Center to have additional floors and therefore a smaller footprint, Duggan said. That decision left enough space at the 142-acre fairgrounds site for at least two more warehouse-style developments — and likely hundreds more future jobs than if just the Fulfillment Center were built.
The mayor also emphasized how Amazon built the Fulfillment Center without tax breaks or development incentives, which is rare for large Detroit projects.
“Whoever heard of somebody coming in and hiring thousands of people and not asking for any tax abatements or incentives — and doing this," Duggan said.
Amazon officials at the event were given The Spirit of Detroit Award. The Amazon leaders then presented a $100,000 check made out to Detroit Neighborhood Block Clubs.
No more fairgrounds
Long before Amazon arrived, the site hosted the Michigan State Fair from 1905 until 2009.
In 2018, the city bought 142 acres of the old fairgrounds from the Michigan Land Bank.
Two years later, the city reached a deal with developers The Sterling Group and Hillwood Investment Properties to bring Amazon to the site. The city sold to the developers in exchange for $16 million, or $9 million for the land and $7 million for a new Detroit Department of Transportation transit center.
Although the deal included no tax breaks or subsidies for the developers or Amazon, opponents of the deal argued the terms were so beneficial that they constituted a form of subsidy.
A group called the State Fairgrounds Development Coalition sought to halt the 2020 sale and compel Amazon to enter into a Community Benefits Agreement with Detroit. The coalitionwon a temporary injunction in late October 2020 halting the sale, but it wasquickly reverseddays later by the state Court of Appeals. The deal then went through and construction began.
Today, a new DDOT center is being built near Amazon within the fairgrounds' old Dairy Cattle Building, which was built in 1924. It will replace anearby bus hub on Woodward Avenue.
The facade of the old Michigan State Fair Riding Coliseum, built in 1922, also is being preserved and will tower over a future public park.
And the fairgrounds' historic bandshell, once at risk of demolition, is being refurbished and relocated to Palmer Park.
Developers Sterling Group and Hillwood are building the other two non-Amazon developments at the old fairgrounds site.
One is a 180,000-square-feet Target distribution center for online orders, which is expected to be done next summer. The other is a 292,552-square-foot warehouse along 8 Mile that appears to be mostly built, although no tenants have been announced.
Those wishing to apply for a job at the new Detroit Fulfillment Center can go to Amazon.com/jobs or Detroitatwork.com/amazon or visit the on-site hiring center to set up an appointment.
Amazon Facilities in Michigan
- 6 Fulfillment Centers
- 4 sorting centers
- 13 Delivery Stations
- 1 same-day-focused delivery station
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