Seasonal hiring in hospitality starts earlier as festive demand builds
From India's festive season to Christmas in Nashville and Austria's ski resorts, hospitality employers are recruiting seasonal staff sooner and leaning harder on people who have worked the season before.
Josef Hoffman
3 min read
Seasonal hiring for the 2026 festive period has started earlier than usual across several hospitality markets, as operators try to secure frontline staff before competition for candidates peaks. The pattern is clearest in India, but resorts in the US and Europe show the same instinct: recruit early, rehire people who already know the job and keep the best of them beyond the season.
India’s festive seasonal hiring surge
Adecco India expects 2.5 to 2.7 lakh (250,000 to 270,000) temporary and gig jobs for the 2026 festive season, up 15 to 20% on last year, with hospitality hiring forecast to grow 25%. The staffing group told People Matters that 80% of employers report frontline talent shortages, with a gap of 10 to 15% between demand and supply at peak.
Timing is shifting too. According to Adecco, many organisations are starting preparations up to 12 weeks before the festive season, compared with 8 to 10 weeks in 2025, and nearly a quarter of festive hires are expected to move into longer-term assignments. “This year’s festive season is seeing hiring intent remain resilient despite a more complex global business environment,” said Deepesh Gupta, Director and Head of General Staffing at Adecco India.
NLB Services forecasts 2 to 2.5 lakh seasonal and gig jobs between July and December, naming hospitality and travel among the sectors preparing for peak demand. It expects hiring in Tier II and III cities to grow by 25 to 30%. Varun Sachdeva, SVP and APAC Head, told Outlook Business that the season is becoming “a real-time stress test for India’s workforce”.
Resorts recruit early and rehire returners
In the US, Marriott-owned Gaylord Opryland in Nashville held seasonal hiring events on 29 August, 19 September and 26 September for its 43rd A Country Christmas, recruiting servers, bartenders, baristas and ambassadors with the promise of flexible schedules and a free meal each shift. Dollywood ran events from late July for autumn and holiday roles at its resort, including front desk and housekeeping, and encouraged applicants to attend the earliest event possible. Neither disclosed a headcount.
Europe’s alpine markets formalise the returner principle. Austria’s Seasonal Quota Ordinance 2026 sets a tourism base quota of 5,500 workers, which can be exceeded by up to 50% in peak months, and gives priority to returning seasonal workers employed under the quota in the previous five years, according to the Austrian Economic Chamber (WKO). In Cyprus, accommodation and food recorded the highest vacancy rate of any sector in the second quarter of 2026, at 4.6%.
A softer picture in the US
Not every market is running hot. US accommodation and food services had 673,000 job openings in July 2026, down from 752,000 in May, according to BLS JOLTS data. A Toast survey of 676 restaurant operators found 49% planned to grow staff, down from 60%, with retention and shift scheduling among the most popular answers to labour problems. Retail, often a rival for the same seasonal workers, expects fewer than 450,000 seasonal hires this year, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
In the UK, Indeed reported last October that Christmas job searches were up 28% year on year, a nine-year high, with retail and hospitality leading seasonal hiring. Comparable 2026 data had not been published at the time of writing.
What makes seasonal recruitment work
Evidence on what works comes mostly from employers and surveys rather than controlled studies, but three themes recur. Starting early widens the pool before competitors absorb it. Rehiring returners cuts training time, as Austria’s quota rules recognise. Converting strong seasonal hires into permanent roles, as Adecco expects for about a quarter of festive workers in India, turns a short-term cost into a pipeline.
Scheduling matters as much as sourcing. Seasonal staff who receive fair, predictable rotas are more likely to come back next year, and our guide to scheduling habits that reduce no-shows and burnout covers the basics. For a wider view of recruitment tactics, see eight strategies to fix hotel recruitment in 2026.
