As if heavy traffic, crowded stores and proliferating credit card bills weren't enough,  Christmas shoppers in Alberta face an extra challenge this year — a dire shortage of store staff to serve them.

Albertans are already Canada's most enthusiastic shoppers: Retail sales grew by 16 per cent in the province in the past 12 months, compared with Canada's national rate of six per cent.

Calgary store manager Rhonda Nguyen is putting in longer hours to recruit and train staff.
(CBC)

That's despite a continuing labour shortage in the retail sector that the Retail Council of Canada describes as "severe."

At least one Calgary mall has had to restrict opening hours to avoid chaos in shops.

Krista Moroz, spokeswoman for the city's South Centre Mall, said the early closure at the busiest time year was bad for business, but managers were left with little choice. 

Business is booming in Alberta but staff is short.
(CBC)

"It's sort of a tough position to be in," she said, "because on the one hand you could be open because people want to shop but on the other we have to recognize that our retailers are also our customers and we need to be able to provide an environment to them that is also going to be positive." 

Longer hours

The manager of a women's clothing store said finding and training new staff was tough, and meant even longer hours at work for her.

"I'm definitely putting in a little more hours to go out there to recruit and also when they are in the store, taking a lot more time to train them," , Rhonda Nguyen said.

Aware of the retail staff shortage, many Albertans are beginning their Christmas shopping earlier, according to customers at the South Centre mall.

"A lot of the tellers in the stores are telling us we should shop early or the salespeople," said shopper Maria Juliano, "because there's going to be a huge shortage and huge lineups so that's basically why I'm shopping early."

Shortages are already a problem in Alberta's liquor stores. Many of them are privately owned and operated but they get their products from a provincial distribution company that itself is having trouble finding staff.

Stock running low

Mary Ross, the owner of the Marda Loop Liquor and Wine in Calgary, says this is the worst possible time of year to run low on stock.

"The product is sitting in container loads outside their warehouse, even at the rail yards ,not getting moved into the warehouse so we're out of really important things at Christmas," Ross said.

In September, six Alberta retail chains put expansion plans for the province on hold because of the difficulty in finding staff. The provincial government and the Retail Council of Canada are working on recruitment drives, expanding access for disabled workers in retail and awareness campaigns for students of the possibilities of a retail career.

Gil Mc Gowan, president of  the Alberta Federation of Labour, says retailers should think about paying their staff more if they want to attract people.