About 450,000 Americans are expected to be hired as seasonal workers for the holiday season, a level of seasonal hiring that is a 2.5% drop compared to last year.
Minneapolis-based Target is looking to add 4,200 seasonal team members across Minneapolis-area stores to help meet local demand this holiday season, but that is a number far lower than normal. Target typically hires between 7,000 and 7,400 seasonal workers in the Twin Cities metro area for the holiday season.
And it is shaping up to be a season where people are expecting to spend more than last year, despite economic challenges.
"So what I think what we're seeing is a sort of a turning of the battleships, if you will," explains University of Minnesota marketing professor George John on the holiday outlook. "You know, Target's sort of been the harbinger there. They've struggled the last three years and they're finally sort of turning the ship around, and I think that speaks volumes for retail as a whole."
John says he is seeing the behavior of different groups of people changing as well. The image you have of young people staring at a screen doing all their shopping? It's started to shift.
"Gen Z, for example, is showing signs they actually want to walk into stores," John says. "They don't want to do as much shopping online. I guess they're sick of looking online screens at TikTok and whatnot. So you're starting to see some behavioral changes which would help the retailers."
John says they expect spending to increase this year. Consumer spending remains strong, and unemployment high, but many say they're hedging their bets as prices continue to surge amid gas hikes and inflation driven by the war in Iran.
"The retailers are expecting to have, not a blowout Christmas season or anything like that, but something above inflation, which would be a welcome relief," John adds.
He says that could impact seasonal hiring across the board.
"Hard to know whether the hiring will land, because the link between expected sales and hiring has become a little bit more fragmented than it used to be," he says.
Some big employers, such as Spirit Halloween and Michaels, have announced significant seasonal hiring pushes, while others like Amazon and Bath & Body Works have not yet disclosed their plans. Nationally, Target has hired about 100,000 for the past several years, and Kohl’s 90,000 for most of the past decade.
So, there will be jobs but they will be competitive as the total number of holiday staff hired this season is anticipated to fall short of previous years.
