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Business View Magazine
residents and thousands more who commute to the
city for work, every day. “We have 17,000 people a day
who drive into Gallatin for jobs and only about 10,000
that drive out,” says Fenton. “So, we have a higher
daytime population than nighttime. It’s been a long-
established fact that people come to Gallatin for jobs.”
Some of the city’s major employers include the 2.7
million square-foot GAP Clothing Distribution Center
and several tier one automotive suppliers who have
added hundreds of thousands of square feet of new
construction and several hundred more jobs. “And just
opening and starting to produce is the Beretta Arms
Company that moved out of Accokeek, Maryland and
relocated here to Gallatin,” Fenton says. “They looked
at 80 sites around the southeast, before choosing
Gallatin. Their general counsel said, ‘Everything they
needed, they found here.’”
“A large part of that was the fact that the city invested
in itself,” Fenton asserts. “It purchased land for an in-
dustrial center, and spent the money on it. It put roads
in; utilities were in place also. So that investment in
itself was directly responsible for the oldest, family-
owned business in the world – they’ll be having their
490th anniversary here in October – a worldwide, rec-
ognized brand name, to come to Gallatin. We are also
the corporate headquarters for Servpro Franchises,
worldwide, and the North American headquarters for
Samick Music. Several companies with a worldwide
footprint are based here in Gallatin.” The city is also
home to Volunteer State Community College, one of
