Amazon Job Fair Looks To Hire 700 At Fall River Center
FALL RIVER, MA (CBS) — Online retailer Amazon is looking to hire 50,000 employees across the country, and 700 of those are supposed to be in Massachusetts.
The Fall River Fulfillment Center is one of 10 across the country and the job fair ran from 8 until noon.
For those four hours, the lines were stretched out the door and around the side of the check-in tent.
The online retailer normally adds staff in August in preparation for the Christmas shopping season, but this event was necessary because of the company's growth nationwide.
Amazon spokesman Cedric Ross says the company is seriously looking to beef-up its Fall River staff.
"We're hopeful that we can fill over 700 jobs. There are definitely 700 opportunities. We hope we can fulfill that," Ross said.
Hundreds turned out today hoping to one of the ones to walk away with a shipping and packaging job.
James Carnahan said he got there early and he just wants a job.
"A job, anything. I don't care if I'm stacking boxes," Carnahan said.
Eager job candidates signed in an waited for their name to be called before they toured the massive shipping facility and headed over to formally fill out an application and get interviewed.
Jerry Johnson was one of those hopefuls who is planning on moving to Southeastern Massachusetts. He said the process wasn't difficult, but it was crowded.
"It's pretty easy for the most part, but a lot more people than I thought," Johnson said. "I did some supervisory work in New York City at DHL and I'm hoping to get the same thing down here."
Ross said that several job offers have already been made.
"I am happy to say that we've already made several offers," Johnson said. "I can definitely say we've made over five offers today, but I think that number is far greater than that."
The Fall River facility focuses on sorting, labeling, and shipping and employs 1,500 people.
Anyone who missed the job fair are still welcome to apply for a job online.