Logistics

San Jose, Calif. — PayPal has launched PassPort, a website designed to provide small businesses with free tools to expand their global sales. PassPort provides country-specific guidance on seasonal sales peaks; shipping and distribution logistics; currency exchange and fees; and customs procedures and taxes.

In addition to holiday-specific content, PassPort presents buying and selling patterns around the globe and across key corridors. PassPort helps businesses start selling internationally quickly via direct links to eBay Marketplace tools.

Cincinnati — Kroger Co. is reportedly planning to build a $250 million distribution center in the suburban Atlanta area. According to the Cincinnati Business Courier, Kroger will open the 1 million-sq.-ft. facility in the suburb of Forest Park, on the site of the former Fort Gillem army base by September 2015.

The distribution center will open with 700 to 900 skilled workers, and eventually employ about 1,500 people. Kroger declined to comment on the report.

Bentonville, Ark. — In the wake of an accident involving a truck driver for Wal-Mart Stores on the New Jersey Turnpike on Saturday, June 7 that left comedian Tracy Morgan critically injured and killed one of Morgan’s associates, comedian James McNair, Wal-Mart Stores has released a fact sheet about its trucking safety guidelines, as well an official statement regarding the crash.

Goodlettsville, Tenn. — Dollar General plans to expand its nationwide presence into three new states within the next year, increasing the company’s presence to 43 states across the country. The discount retailer will begin construction on stores in Maine and Rhode Island in fall 2014, with plans to expand into Oregon in early 2015.

Washington, D.C. — Import volume at major U.S. container ports is expected to increase 7.5% in June as retailers bring unusually high quantities of merchandise into the country early to avoid any potential disruptions after the labor contract with West Coast dockworkers expires. According to the monthly Global Port Tracker report released by the National Retail Federation (NRF) and Hackett Associates, in June U.S. ports followed by Global Port Tracker are expected to handle 1.46 million Twenty-foot Equivalent Units (TEU), up 7.5% year-over-year.

Goodlettsville, Tenn. – Dollar General Corp. has opened its 12th distribution center in Bethel, Pennsylvania. Dollar General announced plans to build the 930,000-sq.-ft. facility in 2012 and broke ground on the facility in fall 2012 with Kinsley Construction.

Playa Vista, Calif. — Marcus & Millichap has arranged the sale of The Shops at Concert Park, a portfolio of two 100% triple-net leased retail condominium shopping centers in Playa Vista, California, a master planned community in the Westside region of Los Angeles.

The buyer paid $16.9 million for the properties. That equates to $743 per sq. ft. The Marcus & Millichap Capital Corp. arranged $10,815 000 in CMBS financing to facilitate the sale.

Washington, D.C. — The Fairfax, Virginia, City Council has approved a rezoning application for Combined Properties’ Fairfax Circle Plaza. The project aims to redevelop the current strip retail center and replace it with a mixed-use development with up to 400 new apartments and 88,000 sq. ft. of retail including a grocery store.

The project is located at the intersection of two major routes just over a half mile from the Vienna, Virginia, Metro station.