TOKYO -- Japan's Fast Retailing will allow around one-fifth of full-time employees to take three-day weekends in exchange for longer work hours starting in October in a move to hold onto talented workers amid a labor shortage.
The company will first introduce the schedule at its Uniqlo casual clothing stores. It will offer the around 10,000 employees who work full time at one of the chain's 840 locations across Japan the option of a four-day week. The change will let the retailer raise the number of such employees, who help boost business at each store by tailoring sales strategies to local customers, to 16,000.
