First published in New Hampshire Business Review, June 8, 2026.

As New Hampshire enters another summer tourism season, recent employment data show how seasonal hiring patterns may be changing across the Grante State. Summer employment is important to New Hampshire’s tourism, recreation, hospitality, and retail sectors. Private-sector employment typically rises during the summer months.

New Hampshire Employment Security data show private-sector industries did see growth in June, July and August 2025, but the increase was smaller than what the State has seen on average over the past decade.

Total private-sector employment increased from May to August in 2025, but this increase was 17% smaller than the 2024 increase in employment. Total private-sector employment increased from 607,047 jobs in May to 618,165 jobs in August following a peak in July at 620,646 jobs. From 2015 to 2024, the percent increase of total private sector employment from May to August was about 2.9% (excluding the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on 2020). In 2025, it was just 1.8%, reflecting 6,146 fewer seasonal jobs than the non-pandemic 2015-2024 average.

In 2025, 62% of the summertime increase in employment came from the Accommodation and Food Service industry, which includes hotels and restaurants. Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation, which includes outdoor recreation businesses, camps, and entertainment venues and accounted for 26% of overall summer employment growth. Construction accounted for almost 8%, as the warmer months may have allowed for more building and maintenance activity. Retail Trade, which has historically been a primary contributor, was less prominent in 2025 than the average from the last decade, including a summer employment increase only about half the size of 2024’s expansion.

From 2015-2019 the average seasonal increase in private-sector employment was about 16,595 while the 2021-2024 average was 19,675.  While there were increases in summertime employment immediately following the pandemic, 2023 summer seasonal employment (16,465) was about at the same level as 2015 (16,433). Seasonal employment was lower in 2024 and 2025 than in 2015.

The slower growth last summer may reflect several factors, including a constrained labor force, increased difficulty hiring seasonal workers from foreign countries, affordability challenges that have made living near tourism centers harder for workers, or shifts in tourism and consumer spending patterns.

While these data can only offer limited insight into the permanence of these changes, they highlight that workforce availability may increasingly shape the ability of businesses and local economies to fully benefit from peak seasonal economic activity as New Hampshire enters the summer tourism season for 2026.