Thanks to voters, starting January 1, 2018, businesses will be able to take advantage of the exemption on the following four classes of inventory:
• Class 1: Inventory of goods in the process of being manufactured or produced, including raw materials and partly finished goods;
• Class 2: Finished goods produced in Georgia and held by the original manufacturer within the last 12 months;
• Class 3: Finished goods stored in Georgia within the last 12 months and destined for shipment out of state; and
• Class 4: Stock-in-trade stored in e-commerce fulfillment centers.
While several cities in Gwinnett County had previously adopted exemptions for Classes 1-3, Norcross is currently the first to offer Class 4 in the county and one of a few cities throughout the metro Atlanta region to offer the incentive. Online retailers and fulfillment centers are growing in size and demand, particularly those with next-day delivery services. Immediate access to highways, close proximity to metro Atlanta and Hartsfield-Jackson Airport, and now, inventory tax exemptions for companies such as Amazon that operate ecommerce fulfillment centers make the City of Norcross an attractive location for these types of businesses.
Furthermore, Georgia ranks as the 5th largest overall logistics employer in the nation and Norcross plays a significant role within this industry. In 2015, Norcross was identified as one of seven major logistics hubs for the metro Atlanta region by the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) and the Gwinnett Village CID. By passing Freeport, the incentive helps to better position the city to attract and retain logistics-oriented companies and other industrial business.
