Exterior view of a Walmart store on August 23, 2020 in North Bergen, New Jersey. Walmart saw its profits in the last quarter as e-commerce sales rose during the coronavirus pandemic.
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Walmart is moving more of its full-time employees to two-thirds of the hourly jobs in the US store, with more consistent work schedules through early next year.
This rose from 53% five years ago, but still below the 71% average for the retail and wholesale industry as a whole.
With the move, announced on Wednesday, the nation’s largest private employer says it will have 740,000 of the 1.2 million hourly workers at the US Walmart store that works full-time by Jan. 31. That would mean it will have about 110.00 more full-time workers than it did five years ago. Walmart has approximately 1.5 million employees in the United States, including those at Sam’s Club, distribution centers and in corporate and managerial jobs.
Drew Holler, senior vice president of U.S. operations for Walmart, told the Associated Press on Wednesday that workers are demanding full-time jobs that have better medical and dental benefits. Holler also noted that full-time work gives the Bentonville, Arkansas retailer a competitive advantage because it is able to retain and attract better employees in a highly competitive environment. The moves also come as explosive pick-up and delivery businesses demand more full-time jobs, as Walmart stores function as both fulfillment centers and retail outlets.
“We know that providing more full-time opportunities, along with training skills and equipping partners with tools to make work easier will help us continue to attract and retain top talent,” Holler wrote in a corporate blog.
Walmart’s growing focus on full-time jobs also comes as it creates a team-based structure in its stores where groups of eight to 12 workers work together in an area of a store, such as toys or clothing and is formed.
Walmart believes that any employee who works 34 hours or more full time, even though anyone who works 30 hours a week or more is eligible for health coverage. With the team’s schedule, Walmart workers will have consistent 39- to 40-hour schedules, the retailer said.
But Walmart’s strategy is also taking place as the cut continues to be criticized by labor-backed groups for lagging behind key retailers such as Target, Amazon and Costco in terms of wages. its minimum hours. Costco has just raised its minimum hourly wage to $ 16, while the initial payment to Target and Amazon is $ 15 an hour. Walmart last raised its basic hourly wages for US employees to $ 11 in early 2018, although it increased its initial wages for certain jobs. Holler says Walmart is focusing more on creating clear pathways with better training so workers can climb the ladder.
The approach to full-time staff also comes as Amazon’s online behemoth has faced the greatest union pressure in its history. Walmart Inc. declined to comment on whether his efforts were a way to remove any similar efforts that might occur at the retailer.
Holler said that the full-time approach to staff has been successful in Walmart’s distribution and fulfillment centers, where more than 80% of its workers are full-time.
Mark Mathews, vice president of industry research and analysis at the National Retail Federation, the nation’s largest retail group, says a decade ago there was a movement among retailers to part-time workers . In fact, 31% of retail and wholesale workers, excluding warehouse workers, were part-time in 2010, according to its analysis of government figures.
But in recent years, this number has fallen as the popularity of online shopping has diminished the need to hire odd-numbered workers. In 2017, the percentage of part-time workers fell to 27%, but then rose to 29% last year due to the pandemic.