Macy's to hire more temp workers for online ops this holiday season

But chain will operate 70 fewer stores as sales fall

Macy's to hire more temp workers for online ops this holiday season
A customer exits after shopping at a Macy's store in the Brooklyn borough of New York, May 11. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

 

 

(Reuters) — This holiday season Macy's will employ more workers at its distribution and warehouses to support its online business as it operates 70 fewer stores compared to last year.

The department store operator said on Thursday it would hire 18,000 workers to fulfill online orders, including shipping and packaging, up 20 per cent from a year earlier.

In total, the company plans to hire around 80,000 seasonal workers for the holiday season, down from 83,000 last year.

The news comes a day after rival Target said it would hire 43 per cent more seasonal workers, or a total of 100,000 workers, for the holiday season.

It was for the first time in five years that Target increased the number of holiday workers it would hire, following the retailer's first comparable sales rise in more than a year. Seasonal hiring plans typically point to retailers' sales expectations for the holiday season, which starts a day after Thanksgiving and continues into early January, and accounts for nearly a third of the companies' annual sales.

U.S. staffing firm Radial expects retailers, including Neiman Marcus, Ralph Lauren and Toys R Us, to hire 35 per cent more workers this holiday season to fill positions at distribution centers as well as for ancillary services in stores such as order-online-pick-up-in-store and doorstep delivery.

Macy's, like other department store operators, has been grappling with weak sales for years, as shoppers spend less on apparel and more on experiences, and competition from online retailers such as Amazon.com intensifies.

For fiscal year ending January, Macy's expects its sales to fall between 3.2 per cent and 4.3 per cent, with comparable store sales declining two per cent to three per cent.

 

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