Your Summer Hiring Playbook: 5 Tips for Staying Fully Staffed

Alexis Miller
Jun 10
4 min read

Every summer, the same story unfolds: demand rises, employees disappear on vacation, and business owners scramble to fill shifts. However, summer doesn't necessarily create staffing problems, it just exposes the ones you've been ignoring all year long.

“If you’re not proactively marketing your jobs and streamlining your hiring process, you’re going to lose talent to whoever does it faster and better,” says Alexis Miller, Marketing Director at Juvo Jobs.

Employers are being forced to rethink how they approach seasonal staffing. Find out what's fueling the labor shortage and learn how top businesses are staying one step ahead.

What's Fueling the Summer Staffing Squeeze

Summer amplifies every staffing challenge. Employees take PTO, students leave part-time roles for internships or travel, and parents have to fill in for childcare gaps. Hourly, seasonal industries, like hospitality, food service, retail, and construction, see an explosion in customer volume. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, accommodation and food services typically report some of the highest separation rates each summer, with August seeing the highest spike compared to the rest of the year.

What makes 2025’s summer even trickier is that labor force participation among younger workers is still below pre-pandemic levels. That means fewer Gen Z workers to fill the seasonal pipeline.

In many cities, job seekers have options. The question for employers isn’t, ‘Will someone take this job?’ It’s ‘Why would someone choose my job over the one down the street?’

5 Tips Employer Should Know for Summer Hiring

1. Start Early

The most successful businesses didn’t wait for Memorial Day to think about staffing. They began outreach in April or earlier, forecasting coverage gaps and locking in returning seasonal workers ahead of time.

If you're already behind, don't panic. Not every role needs 40 hours, so shift your focus to flex workers, or those who want 10–20 hours a week. Use a tool like Juvo Jobs that allows you to post opportunities to local workers already looking for part time jobs to fill roles faster and reduce pressure on your full-timers.

2. Market Your Jobs Like a Product

In a competitive market, a job post is a sales pitch. Employers are reworking their listings to lead with what matters most: flexible schedules, quick pay, local convenience, and a supportive team.

"You’re not just filling roles, you’re competing for attention. If your job post is five paragraphs of requirements and no personality, you're invisible."

— Alexis Miller, Marketing Director for Juvo Jobs

Short-form video introductions, simplified applications, and mobile-friendly job postings are converting better than traditional listings. And companies that promote jobs on platforms where hourly workers already spend time—including social media and geolocation-based apps like Juvo—are seeing faster applicant flow.

3. Cross-Train Your Core Staff

If your best cashier is out for a week, can your stocker step in? Smart teams are investing in quick cross-training to keep operations moving during peak periods. Identify who on your team can flex into other roles and train them before you're short staffed.

Plus, cross training makes your workforce do their jobs better. According to a 2024 Gallup study, 60% of workers say the opportunity to learn new skills is a key reason they were more effective at their job.

4. Offer Incentives That Actually Matter

You don’t need to break the bank, but a little extra goes a long way. Summer bonuses for perfect attendance, referral rewards, or even gas cards can reduce no-shows and keep morale high.

Some Juvo employers have gone a step further, offering instant payouts through earned wage access tools, which has been increasingly popular for the hourly workforce.

Flexibility is another major incentive important to hourly workers. Try offering split shifts, hybrid schedules, or compressed workweeks to accommodate more preferences that appeal to your business and your employees.

5. Keep Burnout in Check

PTO season should not feel like punishment for the team left behind. Layering in part-time help, even for just weekends or evenings, can reduce the pressure on your core team. Employers who consistently run lean risk higher burnout and increased turnover heading into fall.

And if you don’t have time to post, screen, and hire temp help on your own, lean on your partners. Juvo Jobs connects employers with ready-to-work job seekers in their local area (no resumes or long applications required).

Turn Summer Hiring Into a Long-Term Win

Summer can be a tough time for hiring hourly workers, but employers who invest in marketing open roles, flexibility, and curating schedules and incentives that work for their teams lay the groundwork for year-round retention.

The companies who figure out how to be more human, more responsive, and more flexible are not just going to survive the summer. They’re going to come out ahead in the fall too.

Need help with summer hiring? Post your first job on Juvo and get in front of job seekers near you today. Use these tips today to help for your summer hiring!

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