John Lewis hiring 10,000 temporary staff for Christmas, offers free meals and bonus

John Lewis, the London-based department store company, announced this week that it would begin hiring new employees for the coming holiday season. It is aiming to add around 10,000 temporary staff as it expects a surge of shoppers this Christmas.

John Lewis operates a line of department stores, the Waitrose supermarket chain, and an online shop in the United Kingdom. With these establishments, the company knows it will need lots of extra hands to make shopping easy for the customers who are expected to shop more in the upcoming most festive time of the year.

To attract more applicants and be able to fill the vacancies, it is luring people by offering free meals and bonuses. These incentives await those who will successfully join the company even for a temporary job to assist with the busy season.

As per Reuters, the benefits being offered by John Lewis is also to help the staff with the rising cost of living. The British retailer revealed it would open 4,000 seasonal roles in its Waitrose supermarket which has 331 locations, 2,000 staff for the 34 John Lewis branches and 4,000 are needed in the company’s supply chain.

The company said they would be hiring the workers through recruitment agencies. Yahoo Finance UK further reported that the job hiring would include drivers and warehouse workers for its facilities. The free meals are going to be offered to both temporary and permanent staff from Oct. 3 to Jan. 6, 2023.

“We pride ourselves on creating a happy workplace because it's our partners who make the difference and it’s thanks to them that John Lewis and Waitrose are two of the UK’s best-loved brands,” John Lewis Partnership’s chief operations officer, Andrew Murphy, said in a statement.

He added, “We are looking forward to welcoming people across the country to grow our team and ensure we deliver a great Christmas for our customers.”