Amazon.com Inc. is getting ready to open a new fulfillment center on the edge of the Chicagoland area. The e-retailer, No. 1 in the Internet Retailer 2015 Top 500 Guide, announced today it will operate a nearly 500,000-square-foot facility in Joliet, Ill.

Amazon began shopping for warehouse space in the state last fall, saying then it planned to invest $75 million in Illinois. Amazon began collecting local sales tax on orders shipped to Illinois addresses earlier this year.

Joliet is less than 50 miles from downtown Chicago. Amazon says it will hire 1,000 full-time workers to staff the facility, which will stock smaller goods, such as books, electronics and consumer goods.

As of June 30, Amazon had 183,100 full and part-time employees globally, a 38.1% increase from a year earlier. Supply chain consultancy MWPVL International Inc. counts 68 Amazon fulfillment centers in the United States along with at least 16 sortation centers. Amazon sortation centers take orders that have already been packed and labeled elsewhere and deliver them to nearby post offices for the final leg of deliveries.

Amazon in June opened a 1 million square foot fulfillment center in Kenosha, Wis.; a sortation center in Kenosha opened in October. Kenosha is about 65 miles north of Chicago. 

Further in the area, in June Amazon began operating a 52,000-square-foot warehouse within the city of Chicago to support Prime Now, with which members of Amazon Prime can get select products delivered in one hour for a $7.99 fee, or for free in two hours.