Dive Brief:

• Breaking from the current retail trend, Amazon Tuesday said it will boost its seasonal hiring by 25%. The e-retail giant will add 100,000 seasonal jobs in domestic fulfillment and sorting centers and has already hired more than 25,000 full-time employees.

• By contrast, Wal-Mart says it plans to hire 60,000 seasonal employees in the United States, as it did last year, and Target will hire 70,000, as it has done for three consecutive years. 

• Overall, retailers will hire some 755,000 for the holiday season, even with last year, according to employment firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

Dive Insight:

Many retailers are keeping their hiring even with last year, in part, they say, because they’ve been hiring more all year long as the economy has improved. And those jobs they are filling this season are tilted toward aiding e-commerce and omnichannel sales and fulfillment, many say.

But Amazon is breaking from that, with a seasonal hiring plan that dwarfs most other retailers.

That could be in part due to its push this year to add more Prime members. Amazon hosted a birthday party this summer that it dubbed Prime Day that is widely seen as accruing more Prime members even more than boosting sales for that day. Amazon Prime VP Greg Greeley said shortly after the day that "hundreds of thousands" of new Prime members signed up to access Prime Day, which was only available for Prime members.