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GameStop Set for Holiday Rush, Plans to Hire 15,000 Associates

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The holiday season is right around the corner and all the retailers are gearing up to make the most out of this festive period, which is generally connoted as the busiest time of the year. After Macy’s (M - Free Report) , Gap (GPS - Free Report) and Target (TGT - Free Report) , GameStop Corp. (GME - Free Report) announced its plans to hire seasonal workers.

In order to provide customers with a great shopping experience and exceptional service during the festive season, the company intends to hire more than 15,000 seasonal associates. The company will deploy these employees across its more than 3,800 GameStop video game and 40 ThinkGeek pop culture U.S. store locations.

Holiday season is a crucial time for retailers as it accounts for a sizeable chunk of yearly revenues and profits. Retailers try to attract customers with early-hour store openings, huge discounts and promotional strategies. Per media reports, Target, Gap, and Macy's intends to employ 1,20,000, 65,000 and 80,000 seasonal workers, respectively.

According to National Retail Federation (“NRF”), retailers are likely to appoint 585,000-650,000 temporary employees this festive season, up from 582,500 last year. Data compiled by the nation's largest retail trade group calls for a 4.3-4.8% rise in November and December sales (excluding autos, gas and restaurant) to $717.45-$720.89 billion, up from $687.87 billion in 2017 and better than the five-year average sales growth of 3.9%.

According to the PwC’s 2018 Holiday Outlook report, customers are expected to increase their holiday expenditures by 5%, this year. To meet the needs of the customers the company is ramping up seasonal staff levels. As an incentive, the company is offering a “Holiday Thank You” by paying one-time holiday bonus, which equals one week of extra pay after the holidays to all its employees, irrespective of current or seasonal deployments, who work through Oct 21 to Jan 8.

Additionally, all seasonal workers will get a rebate of 15% on selected assortments bought at GameStop as well as its Spring Mobile, Simply Mac and ThinkGeek stores, and online.


 

GameStop has been undertaking several initiatives to augment revenues. Also, the company is encouraged by the rise in sales of collectibles, buoyed by continued expansion of licensed merchandise offerings and unique product offerings. Backed by these aforementioned factors, this Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) stock has gained approximately 8% in the past six months, outperforming the industry’s 0.2% growth.  You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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