Mediterranean Shipping expands local office

Charleston Regional Business Journal
Molly Parker
November 20, 2008

Mediterranean Shipping Co. is officially moving into its new office this weekend in Mount Pleasant’s Watermark development, where it plans to eventually add 150 workers to its rolls.

The opening of the 44,000-square-foot facility represents a $7 million to $8 million investment by the company, said Sergio Fedelini, Mediterranean Shipping Co.’s vice president.

The shipping company, the world’s second-largest behind Maersk Line, has operated an office on Long Point Road in Mount Pleasant since 1999. The company currently employs 215 people. Mediterranean Shipping announced plans in the summer of 2007 to open a new facility at 700 Watermark Blvd. It will officially begin operations there Monday, Fedelini said.

“The main reason to move to a larger building is because we will be hiring a lot of people over the next two or three years,” Fedelini said. “It’s very nice for our company to be able to offer good jobs to residents in this area when almost every other business is losing jobs.”

Fedelini said he doesn’t know when the company will begin hiring new workers. But, he said, the building has a parking lot for 450 cars and “in a couple of years there will be 450 cars in the lot.”

Despite the global economic situation hammering the shipping industry, Mediterranean continues to grow, he said.

The office coordinates shipping needs for customers at three ports in the Southeast: Charleston; Savannah, Ga.; and Jacksonville, Fla.

The move comes on the heels of the closure of Maersk Line’s call center. This year, the company shut down its center on Long Point Road and moved it to Charlotte, N.C., as part of a consolidation effort. The customer service operation officially closed at the end of August, though employees began transitioning out in February.

Maersk employed 140 at that office.

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