Logistics & Supply Chain Management

• Polk County is Florida’s recognized center for distribution companies. Within a 100-mile radius 8.6 million people reside, making Polk County the largest population base in the Southeastern United States.
• Many of the nation’s largest retail companies have distribution centers in Polk County, including Coca-Cola Enterprises, Haverty’s Home Depot Supply, JC Penney, Lowe’s, Publix Super Markets, Rooms To Go, Sherwin Williams, Wal-Mart, Best Buy, W.S. Badcock Corporation and Advanced Discount Auto Parts.
• Other large distribution centers include Ford Motor Company, Cardinal Pharmaceutical, Colorado Boxed Beef, LeanSCS, McKesson Pharmaceutical, Southern Wine and Spirits, USF Distribution, Commercial Carrier Corporation, FedEx, US Foodservice and Star Distribution.
• The new University of South Florida Polytechnic campus, to be built on Interstate 4 in Lakeland in 2012, will perform research and teach Supply Chain Logistics, RFID, Programmable Logic Control, robotics and will ultimately develop a fabrication facility to design and build new RFID components. The campus will also provide management support to companies, including offering MBA programs for Logistics Management.
• Franwell, a leader in the research, development and implementation of RFID technology for supply chain operations, is headquartered in Lakeland. Franwell assisted the University of Florida in creating a RFID lab at the university’s Center for Food Distribution and Retailing.
• CSX Railroad has announced its intentions to build an integrated logistics center in Winter Haven, which will handle container loads from throughout the United States. The railroad transportation company’s $100 million ILC will be a 1,250-acre terminal and business park with direct access to State Road 60. At build out, the ILC will contain three million square feet of warehouse space, 1.5 million square feet of industrial space and 500,000 square feet of office space.
• From Polk County, companies have easy access to Orlando and Tampa International Airports and to deep water ports, including Tampa, Manatee, Everglades, Jacksonville and Miami.
• The Supply Chain Management Institute at Polk State College teaches Information Systems for Logistics, Procurement and Supply Management, RFID and Logistics. Polk County’s two technical centers teach truck driver training, fork lift operation and picking. The Center for Citrus Research and Education in Lake Alfred, a division of the University of Florida, teaches advanced PLC and food safety procedures.
• Solicore, a worldwide leader in embedded power solutions, manufactures lithium polymer batteries in Lakeland. These battery applications have numerous RFID uses, including electronic shelf labels, inventory powered tags, time and temperature indicators and supply chain tracking with increased read distance and information storage.