Robert Powell, III// October 16, 2013//
The Vitamin Shoppe, a New Jersey-based nutritional products retailer, held the grand opening of its new distribution center in Ashland on Wednesday.
This 311,740-square-foot distribution center began receiving inventory in June and started shipments to stores last month.
As of Tuesday, the Ashland distribution center was shipping products to 56 stores in Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Louisiana.
Tony Truesdale, the company’s CEO, said he expected the distribution center to be shipping to 120 stores by the end of the year.
When plans for the distribution center were announced in August 2012, the company said it would employ more than 170 workers at the site.
The project was expected to represent a total investment of about $39.5 million.
The company operates more than 630 Vitamin Shoppe stores plus 31 stores under the Super Supplements name in the Pacific Northwest.