An increase in customer demand is spurring Amazon.com to create 80,000 seasonal positions at its network of distribution centers across the U.S.
That's a 14 percent increase over the number of temporary workers it hired last year at this time.
"We're excited to be creating 80,000 seasonal jobs, thousands of which will lead to regular, full-time roles with benefits starting on day one," said Mike Roth, Amazon's vice president of North America operations in a statement released Thursday.
The giant online retailer said in its media statement that it plans to convert more than 10,000 of its U.S. seasonal jobs into full-time positions.
Seattle-based Amazon now has more than 50 warehouses which it refers to as fulfillment centers. By the end of the year, it will have 15 sorting centers.
In the company's release, Amazon said the new sortation centers are "fueling a range of innovations like Sunday delivery, later cut-off ordering times for customers and the ability to control packages deeper into the delivery process."
The Associated Press reports Amazon is hoping to avoid problems that occurred last holiday season when shippers such as UPS were caught off guard by spiking online orders, particularly from Amazon.
Amazon employs 132,600 full and part-time workers globally.
People may apply for jobs online at www.workatamazonfulfillment.com.
The National Retail Federation forecasts holiday sales to increase 4.1 percent over last year to $616.9 billion. The group says this would be the first time since 2011 that holiday sales would increase more than 4 percent.
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