AMZN Amazon.com Inc

By Ben Otto and Sebastian Herrera 

This article is being republished as part of our daily reproduction of WSJ.com articles that also appeared in the U.S. print edition of The Wall Street Journal (September 15, 2020).

Amazon.com Inc. plans to hire 100,000 additional employees in the U.S. and Canada, continuing a rapid expansion that began as the coronavirus pandemic forced many people to stay home and shop online for work and other necessities.

Amazon's seemingly relentless hiring this year has come even as the wider economic picture has darkened, with companies across a range of industries slashing workers and filing for bankruptcy. Robust online spending during the crisis has fueled Amazon's growth and created a need for more workers.

Not including temporary employees the company describes as seasonal, its total world-wide workforce will be roughly one million after accounting for the 100,000 new warehouse positions and 33,000 positions Amazon is hiring for in its corporate divisions. Once those positions are filled, it will have more than 700,000 employees in the U.S.

The Seattle-based company, which is the nation's second largest employer behind Walmart Inc., said it would take a few months for all the new hires to be reflected in its financial statements.

New jobs will be added at dozens of Amazon locations paying at least $15 an hour and including benefits and signing bonuses of as much as $1,000 in some cities. Hiring for the jobs has already begun. The positions are all nonseasonal, Amazon said.

The company also said it would open 100 operational buildings this month alone, including fulfillment centers, delivery stations, sorting centers and other sites. That will add to more than 75 others already opened this year in Canada and the U.S., it said. Amazon has more than 600 facilities in the U.S., according to logistics consultant MWPVL International.

Amazon has experienced a wave of orders this year as coronavirus restrictions pushed millions more people toward online shopping. Retailers like Walmart and Target Corp. as well as e-commerce companies such as Instacart Inc. have also seen immense growth online and hired hundreds of thousands of workers.

Amazon added 175,000 warehouse workers in March and April, 125,000 of whom it said it would keep. Last week, the company said it was in the process of filling 33,000 corporate positions.

That stands in contrast to other companies and industries that are cutting tens of thousands of jobs. Amid a slump in passenger demand, U.S. airlines shed about 50,000 jobs in the first half of the year alone. Traditional retailers like J.C. Penney, Neiman Marcus Group Inc., J.Crew Group Inc. and others have filed for bankruptcy.

Amazon, which accounts for more than a third of online U.S. sales, has recorded record profits during the pandemic. The company posted a record $88.9 billion in sales during its second quarter, and profit doubled year-over-year to $5.2 billion.

In the same quarter, it also spent more than $9 billion in capital projects. The company's nonretail segments, such as its cloud computing and advertising businesses, continue to see fast growth, creating further job opportunities.

Amazon said it is still completing plans on whether it will need to hire seasonal workers for the coming holiday season. The company typically adds staff in the run-up to the season, which is the peak shopping period for retailers. An Amazon spokeswoman said the company was able to make the 100,000 positions nonseasonal because of sustained demand this year.

Amid the rising sales, the company's shares are up almost 70% this year. That has taken its market capitalization to around $1.6 trillion, behind only Apple Inc.

Write to Ben Otto at ben.otto@wsj.com and Sebastian Herrera at Sebastian.Herrera@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 15, 2020 02:47 ET (06:47 GMT)

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