National Retailers Announce Plans to Hire More Than 150,000 Employees

For Americans struggling to get back on their feet following loss of income thanks to furloughs, layoffs, and job shutdowns due to the coronavirus pandemic, a bit of good news comes ahead of the upcoming holiday season.

Everyone knows that major national retailers, as well as shippers such as FedEx and UPS, hire hundreds of thousands of employees each year to help coral the frenzy of holiday shopping, but this year those outlets may be hiring even more people as the average consumer is expected to shop differently than in years past.

According to Market Watch, the experts at Deloitte, a company that provides industry-leading audit, consulting, tax, and advisory services, despite the economic lows this country has faced in 2020, holiday sales are expected to grow by up to 1.5% this year. Total holiday spending between November and January is expected to between $1.147 trillion and $1.152 trillion.

Target has announced it will be hiring about 130,000 seasonal employees while Walmart says it will hire more than 20,000 temporary employees for the holiday season. Also hiring extra hands this year will be Kohls, although the retailer has not announced how many it will hire. In previous years, Kohls brought on more than 90,000 additional employees for the holiday rush.

Experts anticipate that most of the new holiday positions will focus on employment in distribution centers or at store curbside pickup, especially since half of the people who responded to recent polls issued by BlackFriday.com and SurveyGizmo say they plan to use curbside or contactless pick up when they do their shopping this holiday season.

Also hiring extra helpers are FedEx and UPS. FedEx says it will hire 70,000 seasonal delivery employees and UPS will hire more than 100,000 employees as they brace for an increase in deliveries to people's homes.

If you're interested in seasonal employment at one of the hiring retailers or delivery companies, keep an eye on the employment listings on their website. You'll find jobs at Target here, jobs at Walmart here, and jobs at Kohls here.  Jobs for FedEx can be found here and jobs for UPS can be found here.