Grocery manager openings increased 648% on Glassdoor between March, May

Dive Brief:

Grocery manager, order selector and warehouse manager roles experienced the highest percentage growth among all job openings on employment site Glassdoor between March 2 and May 11 as the U.S. job market waned due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Glassdoor said in an analysis published June 8.
Grocery manager openings alone grew 648% on Glassdoor during this timeframe, with 9,604 open positions listed on May 11. Related roles in the retail and supply chain industries, including forklift operator, warehouse worker and retail merchandiser each experienced more than 20% growth, reflecting the essential nature of these positions, Glassdoor said. Openings for IT specialists and public health advisors also cracked the company's list of the top 10 in-demand jobs.
By contrast, jobs that rely on in-person interactions have been especially impacted by the pandemic, Glassdoor said. The site's number of openings for roles like bookseller, tutor, catering assistant and optician all declined by at least 80% during the March 2 to May 11 timeframe. Overall, Glassdoor saw a 29% decline in job openings between early March and May 11.

Dive Insight:

Grocery chains have been notably active in hiring additional staff during the COVID-19 pandemic amid stock-up shopping and a shift in meal dollars away from restaurants. Kroger announced in May that it had hired more than 100,000 new employees over an eight-week period during the pandemic to fill roles at retail stores, manufacturing facilities and distribution centers as well as e-commerce operations. Walmart hired more than 150,000 workers for its stores and warehouses, including many that were laid off from restaurant and hospitality jobs.

Lidl said in March that it would make newly hired temporary workers eligible for certain medical benefits. Albertsons, in its initiative to hire 30,000 associates, partnered with employers in the hospitality and retail industries to offer part-time jobs to employees from those establishments who had been furloughed or had their hours cut.

Grocers have offered one-time and hourly pay bonuses that recognize the risks employees are taking as essential workers. Three months into the pandemic, some companies like Kroger and Walmart have opted not to renew these bonuses while others, like Target, have extended payouts deeper into the summer and beyond.

A May working paper from researchers at Cornell University found that, conversely, reductions in hiring during the pandemic have hit certain "high-skill" positions particularly hard, including lawyers and doctors. And overall job losses have disproportionately impacted women and people of color, according to multiple analyses.

Some new roles are also being created in response to the pandemic, Glassdoor senior research analyst Amanda Stansell wrote in the company's June 8 report. Examples include temperature checkers and contact tracers. "While these new roles might provide additional opportunities for newly out-of-work job seekers, there aren’t enough new openings to fill the hiring gaps that currently exist across all industries," Stansell said.