Last decade has seen a boom in retail industry, especially outside the Americas and Europe. Major retail brands in the western countries looked into the potential of the third world countries in Africa and Asia and decided to set up their shops in this region. The opening up of new retail shops across the globe has increased the demand of larger workforce due to which the recruitment agencies are having busy days short listing millions of profiles and sending to the retailers for approval.

Recruitment through retail job agencies in Africa has their own pros and cons. Most of these recruitment agencies have their own website and therefore, provide a common platform to both the employer and the prospective job seekers. Whereas, the employer may look for a candidate with the desired skill sets, the job seekers may land with a job in reputed organizations with better pay and growth prospects. The recruitment agencies maintain a huge database of employers and job seekers irrespective of the location. These data can be accessed online with advanced search technique. These companies have the specialization in recruiting for specific industries. Hence, the recruitment agencies specially designed to cater to the needs of retail and fashion industries have the skilled staff to look to hire the best talent to run their business. The fees charged by these agencies vary from one requirement to another and prices are also region specific. The data is also maintained confidential.

Although there are multiple advantages of hiring an external retail recruitment agency, on many occasions, it was found that retail recruitment agency is highly uncompetitive. They lack manpower or resources, who do not even understand the needs/requirements of retail industry. On many occasions, the staff of the retail recruitment agencies is not able to differentiate among the highly skilled or high paid jobs and low skilled jobs or low paid jobs. The agencies are required to understand this gap and work accordingly. Sadly, the reverse happens. It was also found in many occasions that these agencies lack ethics and poach candidates from one recruiter to another. Poaching is a common problem and is ideally a common problem in the recruitment agency. This is not a healthy practice and may result in many companies to loose their talented staff.

Each of the functions has their own advantages and disadvantages and so is the retail industry. Today, retail businesses need people across different functional groups. Although, people believe that most of the retailers employ salespersons and shelf organizers, there is a wide group of recruitment that takes place in the retail sector. They are no longer famous for job ghettos or skills gap. There are many management graduates, IT specialists, etc at different job levels. Although the entry level jobs do not require much experience, for the jobs of other sectors, one compulsorily require the expertise of recruitment agencies. Depending on the rapport and the cost efficiency, an employer may also go to a reputed recruitment agency rather than the ones who are specialized in retail recruitment.