Walmart Shutting Down Another South Jersey Warehouse, Cutting Jobs

Editor's note: This article now includes a comment from a Walmart spokesperson.

SWEDESBORO, NJ — Walmart will lay off more than 100 employees as it shuts down another South Jersey warehouse.

The Sam's Club fulfillment center in Swedesboro, Gloucester County, will close on March 7, according to a layoff notice Walmart Inc. posted this month. Walmart, which owns Sam's Club, will cut 113 jobs as a result.

It's the second Walmart-owned warehouse in South Jersey to wind down operations this year. Walmart also closed one of its two fulfillment centers in Pedricktown, laying off 271 workers from the Salem County facility.

The closures come as Walmart continues to change its distribution model, which includes consolidating online-order warehousing to a handful of massive "next generation" fulfillment centers.

One of them is a 1.5 million-square-foot facility that opened a few months ago in Greencastle, Pennsylvania. As a result, Walmart shut down its Pedricktown fulfillment center.

Walmart's fulfillment centers typically fill smaller, online orders, while the distribution centers ship goods to stores.

Currently, Walmart's next-generation fulfillment centers don't handle Sam's Club orders. But changes in the corporation's fulfillment centers contributed to the Swedesboro facility's upcoming closure.

"We're continuously evolving our fulfillment network to improve service and meet the changing demands for our customers and members," a Walmart spokesperson told Patch. "Over time, as our fulfillment network has grown and we have launched new buildings, we've been able to serve customers and members with better reliability and speed by shifting volume to these other facilities."

The timing of the closure is driven by Walmart's lease in Swedesboro. Impacted employees will have opportunities to work in the company's other warehouses, which include Pedricktown's other fulfillment center, another in Westampton and a distribution center in Smyrna, Delaware.

Walmart is also offering $7,500 plus relocation fees to laid-off employees who choose to transfer to a next-generation fulfillment center — including the Pennsylvania facility, which is 175 miles west of South Jersey.

Employees who were laid off at the Pedricktown warehouse received the same offer.

Despite the recent closures, Walmart is bringing a grocery-distribution center to South Jersey. The Pilesgrove, Salem County, facility is projected to begin operations in 2027 and offer about 400 jobs.