United Parcel Service plans to add 30 to 50 workers in West Columbia and will renovate its regional hub at Columbia Metropolitan Airport as part of the companys larger effort to become more competitive.
Atlanta-based UPS is making the Midlands facility a key part of an expanded heavy-freight shipping network that will improve five of its seven U.S. hubs, the company said Tuesday.
UPS has shipped smaller packages overnight for decades but often has had to move packages weighing more than 150 pounds slower, on the basis of how much space was available on jets, company spokesman Bob Godlewski said.
Now, the company wants to compete more aggressively against Memphis, Tenn.-based FedEx Corp., Godlewski said.
UPS upgraded network will ship throughout North America with overnight, second-day and other air-freight services.
UPS had $36.6 billion in 2004 revenue and employs 328,000 people nationwide. Its national air hub is in Louisville, Ky.
The company is spending a total of $24 million to upgrade the Columbia facility and operations in Ontario, Calif.; Rockford, Ill.; Dallas; and Philadelphia, Godlewski said. It will add a total of 200 jobs.
UPS already employs about 3,500 people in South Carolina. The renovation of the 313,000-square-foot hub in Columbia and the hiring of new workers will be complete some time next year.
UPS has had a package-collection gateway at Columbia Metropolitan Airport since 1982, and the company invested $30 million in a regional hub that opened there in 1996, Godlewski said.
The companys jets fly in and out of the airport 14 times daily, and the company rents space on six flights per day on other airlines planes.
Tuesdays expansion announcement is very good news for the Midlands, said Ike McLeese, president of the Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce.
They have been a major corporate citizen ... a solid company and a great employer, McLeese said. Both the renovation project and the job openings should be beneficial, he said.
The Midlands air hub serves North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida and Alabama, plus three Northern areas metropolitan New York, northern New Jersey and Chicago.
The hub is mainly for small packages, but as part of the expansion to handle more heavy freight, UPS Midlands facility must be equipped to handle any large item that customers want to ship, Godlewski said.
For instance, in 1996, a UPS plane shipped a four-ton, sick whale from an aquarium, during efforts to return the creature to a better life in the wild.
That whale, named Keiko, had been featured in the movie Free Willy, and it survived about seven years after the move.
Thats probably the biggest live thing UPS has shipped, Godlewski said. After local renovations, UPS should be able to ship similar-weight items overnight through Columbia, although a live whale would require months of planning, he said.
UPS shares closed at $71.58 Tuesday, down 49 cents.
