Amazon will hire 250,000 employees in preparation for the holiday season, the company announced, and 1,900 of them will be in Utah.
Amazon is hosting a hiring event Friday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the Hampton Inn & Suites Salt Lake City Airport, 307 N. Admiral Byrd Road, Salt Lake City — west of the airport. Applicants can go to hiring.amazon.com to register.
The online retailer has 16 facilities across Utah, plus four Whole Foods Market stores — in Salt Lake City at Trolley Square and Sugar House, in Cottonwood Heights, and in Park City’s Kimball Junction. (Amazon bought Whole Foods in 2017.)
Amazon began offering same-day, five-hour delivery from its Salt Lake “mini” fulfillment center in 2022 and hired 250 people to staff it.
A 17th location was supposed to open in Marriott-Slaterville, near Ogden, in 2022 but remains empty. A spokesperson for Amazon said none of the holiday job openings are at the still-vacant warehouse.
Amazon has two contracts, worth a combined $8 million, with the Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity. The state agreed to $5.6 million in tax breaks over 8 years when the fulfillment center opened near the Salt Lake City International Airport in 2017, if the company could hit certain growth and wage benchmarks. According to the state’s database, the contract is still active and Amazon is eligible for a 20% rebate, of which the state has issued between zero and 25%. The company’s web services branch also has a $2.5 million contract with the state, but has not claimed its credits.
Amazon has created more than 7,000 direct jobs in Utah since 2010, according to a 2023 Economic Impact Report. The company said in 2021 that it had 8,000 employees across its 16 locations.
Amazon has faced criticism in recent years for working conditions in warehouses and fulfillment centers, where employees are expected to work quickly and around-the-clock. Protests disrupted some of the company’s busiest days — Prime Day and Black Friday — in 2019, the same year a report from the Center for Investigative Reporting found Amazon’s rate of serious injury was more than double the industry standard. Salt Lake distribution center employees said at the time said the work felt safe, and the compensation and benefits were competitive.
The jobs opening up ahead of the holiday season include packing, picking, sorting and shipping and will pay between $17-28 an hour, according to a news release issued Tuesday. Amazon needs full-time, part-time, and seasonal help, and says seasonal jobs could turn into permanent work.
“Whether someone is looking for a short-term way to make extra money, or is hoping to take their first step toward a fulfilling and rewarding career at Amazon, there’s a role available for them,” John Felton, Amazon’s senior vice president of worldwide operations, said in a statement.
Shannon Sollitt is a Report for America corps member covering business accountability and sustainability for The Salt Lake Tribune. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep her writing stories like this one; please consider making a tax-deductible gift of any amount today by clicking here.
