Retail labour shortage: the wrong diagnosis

In the first quarter of 2026, Quebec retail had 10,100 job vacancies. While nearly every industry is catching its breath, it’s one of only two where the number is going up. And most of these are jobs that require no diploma. The problem may not be the number of candidates, but the way we see them.

Retail against the current

Let’s recall the numbers. Quebec had about 109,100 job vacancies in the first quarter, down 5.6% year over year, according to the Institut de la statistique du Québec. Health care is down, public administration is down, finance is down.

Not retail. Over the same period, it added 1,600 vacancies. A 19% increase.

In fact, a single occupation explains much of the total: retail salespersons, 2,763 vacancies. The fourth most in-demand profession in the province, behind nurses, kitchen helpers and orderlies.

A floor position. No diploma required. Open for weeks.

Labour shortage: the wrong diagnosis

When we talk about a shortage, we point to demographics, or to the lack of interest in service jobs. That’s not wrong. It’s incomplete.

Let’s name it. Part of the explanation is about pay, and it can be measured: Quebec’s vacant positions are offered at $29.15 an hour on average, while salaried employment pays $36.49. A candidate who turns down a below-market rate isn’t missing. They’re doing the math.

But the manager who adjusts the hourly rate and keeps recruiting the same way has only solved half the problem. Because a salesperson isn’t hired for what they’ve done. They’re hired for what they do in front of a customer.

The welcome when the door opens. The calm, on a Saturday in December, with three people waiting. The honesty when the product is out of stock. The customer coming back the following week.

None of these gestures has a line on a résumé. And as long as the résumé stays the first criterion, the hiring process acts like a filter, not an open door.

The paradox of screening on paper

For a sales position, the résumé is the worst tool there is. Not because it lies. Because it’s empty.

For many retail candidates, this is a first job, a return to work after a break, a career change. Their résumé fits on half a page. No sales experience, of course: that’s exactly what they’ve come to get.

The manager, meanwhile, has ten minutes a day to recruit. They open the pile and decide on the only criterion the document gives them: “customer service experience.” They aren’t rejecting bad candidates. They’re rejecting strangers. A smile doesn’t show up on a PDF, and presence can’t be measured by a list of past jobs.

The pool exists. It’s just invisible in the format we impose on it. And while we filter it on paper, the competitor across the street, who took the time to meet the person, has just hired them.

What shows in thirty seconds

Retailers already know this, without putting it into words. When a person walks in with their résumé in hand and introduces themselves at the counter, the manager has made up their mind before reading the first line. The tone, the eyes, the way they say hello. Thirty seconds, and the essentials are there.

The idea is to do this for every application, not only for the ones that walk through the door. To ask to see the person before reading their background. A short video introduction, recorded on a phone, shows exactly what the floor demands: presence, energy, the way they express themselves.

That’s how Joblinks works, a Quebec video recruiting platform: candidates introduce themselves on video, the employer shows their store and their team, and the two talk directly. For a manager, the difference is measured in hours. Fewer résumés to decode, fewer exploratory interviews, and a first meeting that confirms rather than discovers. The position gets filled in weeks, not months.

The labour shortage in retail is real. But part of what we call a shortage is a visibility problem: candidates who exist, and a tool that doesn’t show them. That problem, a retailer can fix this week: hire for what you see, rather than for what you read.