Hiring
ITT Goulds Pumps, an industrial pump maker owned by ITT Inc., plans to invest $31 million and create 57 jobs at a new manufacturing and distribution center in Memphis, Tennessee state officials said Monday, Oct. 19. It will be the company’s first Tennessee location.
The company will move into a facility at 5633 Mineral Wells Road in Shelby County, according to the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development. The state said the project will expand the company’s distribution, warehousing and inventory management.
Outgrowing a Mississippi site
The Memphis center replaces space that has become too small. ITT Goulds Pumps currently runs a distribution center in Southaven, Mississippi, and the state said the company “has outgrown the existing facility.”
The state describes the 57 positions as new jobs. The announcement does not say what will happen to the Southaven site or its employees, whether current workers will transfer to Memphis, when hiring will start, or what the new jobs will pay. It also does not mention any state or local incentives. Job seekers should treat the 57 as a planned hiring target, not jobs that already exist.
Hamdy Salem, president of ITT Goulds Pumps, said the Memphis expansion “strengthens our operational capabilities, expands our capacity to support future growth, and enhances our ability to serve customers across North America.” The state said the larger site will help the company increase inventory availability and meet rising customer demand.
The company
ITT Goulds Pumps was founded in 1848 in Seneca Falls, New York, where it is still headquartered, and the state release calls it the world’s first manufacturer of iron pumps. It makes pumps for the energy, mining, power, chemical, pulp and paper, water and wastewater, and general industrial markets. It is part of the Flow Technologies segment of ITT Inc., a Stamford, Connecticut, manufacturer that employs more than 11,000 people worldwide.
Officials pointed to Memphis’s freight connections. Deputy Gov. and Economic and Community Development Commissioner Stuart C. McWhorter cited the city’s “access to rail, interstate highways, air and waterways.” State Sen. London Lamar, a Memphis Democrat, said the investment reflects “the strength of our public investments in workforce development and training.”
The local job market
The project arrives in a metro area where manufacturing employment is below its level of a year ago while transportation and warehousing employment is higher. BLS figures for the Memphis, TN-MS-AR metro area, which are not seasonally adjusted and are preliminary for September, show manufacturing employment of 38,300 in September 2026, down from 39,000 a year earlier. Transportation and warehousing employment rose to 93,900 from 92,200. Total nonfarm employment was 657,400, up from 656,300.
The metro area’s unemployment rate was 4.6% in August, the latest month available, compared with 4.5% in August 2025. Metro figures for September are due Oct. 28. Statewide, Tennessee’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 3.4% in September, which BLS said Tuesday was significantly below the national rate of 4.2%.
Fifty-seven jobs is a small addition to a metro labor market of that size. For workers with warehouse, inventory or production experience in the Memphis area, it is one more employer to watch once the company starts recruiting.
Sources
- Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development, “ITT Goulds Pumps Announces Establishment of Tennessee Manufacturing, Distribution Presence in Shelby County,” October 19, 2026. https://tnecd.com/news/itt-goulds-pumps-announces-establishment-of-tennessee-manufacturing-distribution-presence-in-shelby-county/
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, State and Metro Area Employment, Memphis, TN-MS-AR total nonfarm and industry series (SMU4732820…), accessed October 20, 2026. https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/SMU47328200000000001
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Local Area Unemployment Statistics, Memphis, TN-MS-AR unemployment rate (LAUMT473282000000003), accessed October 20, 2026. https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LAUMT473282000000003
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, “State Employment and Unemployment — September 2026,” October 20, 2026. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/laus.nr0.htm
Featured photo: Old Goulds pumps at the Lincoln Park pumping station in Seattle, March 13, 1931, shortly before they were replaced; the cylinders carry the maker's Seneca, N.Y., marking. Seattle Municipal Archives. Historical image; not the planned Memphis facility. Photo: George Chew / Seattle Municipal Archives, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0). Cropped from the original.
