Recession is an ugly word to retailers looking toward a successful holiday season. To college students, the phrase “hiring freeze” has essentially the same meaning.

Students shouldn’t be discouraged by the words “recession” or “hiring freeze” or by the length of the holiday break. Holiday jobs are still available.

As a quarter school, Ohio State students are able to earn a decent amount of money in a relatively short period of time. The problem students might encounter is many companies aren’t hiring the same amount of seasonal staff this year.

Winter break lasts a month, compared to the three weeks received in previous years.

The easiest and sometimes most attractive jobs for many college students to obtain is one in retail. Many retail stores offer discounts to their employees to make the job more attractive.

The Limited Inc. offers all of its employees a 30 percent discount in the store which the person works, and they are also given a 20 percent discount for any of the other Limited Inc. stores, said spokesman Tim Erler.

For this holiday season, Limited Inc. is looking to hire 75,000 season workers for their 4,650 stores nationwide, he said. The number is down from the 80,000 workers hired last year because of the sale of the Lane Bryant branch of the company.

The average number of hours allotted to an employee has increased from 10-12 hours to 14-20 hours per week, Erler said, even though there is a decrease in the number of seasonally hired workers.

The hiring campaign for seasonal work began in October. However, it is still possible to obtain a seasonal position in a few of the stores, said Erler. Seasonal workers were able to begin work two weeks before Thanksgiving to learn the basics of how a Limited-owned store runs.

For those who don’t find retail all that appealing there are different seasonal jobs available.

Frank’s Nursery, located throughout the Columbus area, hires seasonal help for cashiers, stock and the handling of Christmas trees.

“The number of people hired depends on the volume of the store,” said Bob Rannells, manager of Frank’s Nursery on West Broad Street.