Amazon.com Inc., No. 1 in the 2020 Digital Commerce 360 Top 1000, is hiring 100,000 full and part-time employees across the U.S. and Canada, offering starting wages of at least $15 an hour, the latest announcement in the Seattle-based ecommerce giant’s hiring spree.
The new jobs include benefits and sign-on bonuses of as much as $1,000 in select cities and access to training programs, the company said in a statement on Monday. This is in addition to the 33,000 corporate and technology employees the Seattle-based ecommerce giant announced last week, it said.
Amazon also plans to open 100 new operations buildings in September across fulfillment centers, delivery stations, sorting centers and other sites, the company said in the statement.
Amazon has been adding jobs globally as its business and market valuation have soared, increasing numbers of full and part-time employees by about 10% to 876,800 in the first six months of 2020, according to its July financial report. Earlier this month, the company announced plans to add 7,000 permanent workers in the U.K. and has made similar announcements in Ireland and South Africa.
Its shares have surged almost 70% this year, lifting its market value to $1.56 trillion, as the company’s online shopping services became vital to many households under lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Still, the company has attracted criticism for how it’s treated workers. The company posted—and then abruptly deleted—a position for an analyst to research “labor organizing threats against the company” calling it “inaccurate.” However, labor activists said the listing suggests Amazon is trying to prevent workers from collective bargaining, which drew attention earlier in the year after some employees protested conditions in warehouses that they said put them at risk of catching the coronavirus.
Amazon said in July it had spent $4 billion in the second quarter on COVID-19-related initiatives to keep employees safe and provide them with additional compensation. Founder and CEO Jeff Bezos is the world’s wealthiest person, with a net worth of about $184 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Amazon to hire 7,000 people in UK
Amazon.com also plans to hire an additional 7,000 people for permanent jobs in the U.K. this year, increasing its workforce to more than 40,000 to deal with a surge in demand for online shopping.
The company has already added 3,000 jobs to its U.K fulfillment centers, sort centers and delivery stations, and the additional roles will be in its corporate offices and two new fulfillment centers opening in the North East and the Midlands in the autumn of this year, Amazon said in a statement on Thursday.
Amazon is looking for engineers, human resources and IT professionals, as well as finance, health and safety professionals, and packing and shipment teams. In addition, the company said it was creating about 20,000 new seasonal positions in the U.K. across three pop-up facility centers for the holidays.
The U.K., like many other countries, is struggling to find ways to protect workers after the COVID-19 pandemic forced shops and restaurants to shut. The government is under pressure to extend a furlough program that’s helping to pay wages at about 10 million jobs in the U.K. and is due to wind down next month. Business Secretary Alok Sharma called Amazon’s move “hugely encouraging.” The company also announced plans to create 3,500 new tech and corporate jobs in U.S. cities last month.
Amazon said in Thursday’s statement that it provides some of the “most advanced workplaces of their kind in the world,” with systems to ensure the wellbeing and safety of all employees. Workers will be offered benefits including private medical insurance, life assurance, income protection, subsidized meals and an employee discount, as well as a company pension plan.
In other ecommerce personnel news:
- 1-800-Flowers.com Inc. (No. 64 in the Top 1000) plans to hire more than 10,000 seasonal employees—quadrupling its workforce—across the U.S. to keep up with the demand for online gifting for the upcoming holiday season. Hiring already began at some of its brands such as Harry & David and The Popcorn Factory. Its available seasonal positions vary by brand but are focused in areas like production, gift assembly, customer service, and distribution and fulfillment center operations.
- Home furnishings retailer Wayfair Inc. (No. 6) appointed Fiona Tan as global head of customer and supplier technology. In her role, she will be in charge of engineering organization and strategy for the development of customer and supplier technologies and systems. Prior to joining Wayfair, Tan spent more than six years at Walmart Inc. (No. 3) as senior vice president of engineering, customer technology at WalmartLab and head of technology at Walmart U.S. “We are thrilled to welcome Fiona to Wayfair as she brings with her extensive experience, technical depth and proven ability to scale teams and technology amid considerable growth,” says Jim Miller, chief technology officer, Wayfair.
- Amazon has tapped Dave Clark as chief of its retail business. He will replace Jeff Wilke, a longtime lieutenant to founder and CEO Jeff Bezos. Wilke plans to retire in the first quarter of 2021, the company announced in a securities filing. Clark, a veteran Amazon executive, will run the Worldwide Consumer unit, a group that encompasses most of what shoppers know of Amazon, including the retail website and the growing logistics empire that stocks and delivers items. Clark joined Amazon out of business school the same year as Wilke. He was named logistics chief in 2013. In 2016, Wilke was elevated to chief executive of the global consumer business. In a parallel move, Andy Jassy was named chief executive of the Amazon Web Services cloud computing division, a structure that made both men natural candidates to succeed Bezos were he to step down. In an email to employees, Bezos saluted Wilke and called him a tutor to him and everyone at the company. “Jeff has also set us up to succeed in his absence,” Bezos wrote. “I can’t think of someone more suited to step into Jeff’s role than Dave Clark.”
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Custom fabric retailer Spoonflower appointed Jessica Lesesky as the company’s chief revenue officer. Lesesky will be responsible for driving sales for Spoonflower, focusing on brand and performance marketing initiatives as well as customer acquisition and retention. Lesesky’s appointment follows Spoonflower’s appointments of CEO Michael Jones and chief financial officer Brad Schomber earlier this year. Spoonflower is in the process of recruiting a chief technology officer as well as a head of diversity, equity, inclusion and sustainability to further round out its leadership team.
“At Spoonflower, we’re focused on growing the business responsibly to keep our customers top of mind and continue to provide a source of income for our artist community,” says Jones. “In [Lesesky’s] short time here, she’s already driven meaningful growth for Spoonflower, serving as an integral part of our COVID-19 response hub, building relationships with strategic partners like the Masks Now Coalition for our Buy A Mask, Give a Mask program and positioning us to achieve an incredible increase in new customers.” - NorthShore Care Supply (Samela Inc., No 790), an online retailer of adult diapers, appointed Dhiraj Rustagi to the newly created position of vice president of ecommerce and marketing. His responsibilities include expanding the company’s reach, implementing ecommerce strategies, managing customer acquisition and retention, and increasing market share. Prior to joining NorthShore Care Supply, Rustagi worked as director of digital transformation and digital customer experience at automotive parts distributor Omron Management Center of America, and global digital product and strategy owner at baby formula manufacturer Mead Johnson Nutrition. “As we implement new growth initiatives, Dhiraj’s leadership and extensive experience will help us continue to build our marketing capabilities and ecommerce business while building NorthShore into a global, omnichannel brand,” says Adam Greenberg, NorthShore’s president and founder.
- Fraud management services company ClearSale plans to hire 500 new employees by the end of September after experiencing significant growth, thanks to an increased need for fraud protection for ecommerce businesses, the company says. The new roles will include positions for IT, data science, fraud analysts and manual transaction reviewers. “Recent world events have accelerated our plans for expansion, rather than forcing us to step back, as has happened to many companies,” said Rafael Lourenco, an executive at ClearSale, “Plus, with the holidays fast approaching, fraudulent transactions and concerns over false declines will only increase. We are investing in our team right now by bringing on more skilled and dedicated employees in order to ensure we can meet the protection needs of our global client base going forward.”