In a move expected to provide a healthy boost to the retail sector of the economy, Wal-Mart (NYSE:WMT) announced that it will add approximately 10,000 new jobs at its stores throughout the United States.
The 10,000 new retail positions will be added as a result of the company’s plans to expand or remodel some current stores while opening new locations. Wal-Mart will also be enhancing services in the online commerce area.
Besides in-store retail jobs, Wal-Mart will also be hiring workers in online grocery ordering and instructors at its employee training facilities. In a recent financial filing, the chain announced that its online sales are on the upswing. The company also stated that profits are beating Wall Street analysts’ projections.
Wal-Mart, based in Bentonville, Arkansas, announced that the hiring plan in retail will complement an anticipated 24,000 new jobs in construction.
The hiring spree reflects a consistent trend of expansion that Wal-Mart has undergone in recent years. When announcing the 10,000 new retail jobs, a spokesman for Wal-Mart pointed out that the company has added about the same number of jobs annually for the past several years.
Wal-Mart’s plan for the new jobs was the latest in a series of positive proclamations from the company. Wal-Mart earlier announced a strategy to devote $6.8 billion to capital investments in the next fiscal year. Wal-Mart is in the midst of a $250 billion effort to source and assemble more American-made products to sell in its stores. The company also announced that its nonprofit division will offer six university grants dedicated to studying innovations in the textile business.
Wal-Mart was one of several major U.S. firms to unveil expansion plans recently. General Motors (NYSE:GM) announced that it will hire thousands of people for white-collar positions, and online retailer Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) announced that it will be hiring 100,000 full-time employees in the next 18 months.
With more than 11,000 locations in 28 nations, Wal-Mart is the largest traditional retail company in the world. The company has more than 2.3 million employees throughout the world, including 1.5 million workers in the United States.