Area retailers are preparing to fill holiday jobs this month, despite predictions of sluggish retail sales nationally.

The Borders store in Westfield Southlake mall in Hobart plans to bring back college students and teachers from previous holiday seasons, but could add new hires, store manager Bridget Phillips said.

"We always take a look at bringing on additional qualified people at holiday time," Phillips said.

The Bass Pro Shops store in Portage will rely on a segment of its work force hired specifically to fill in during holiday and crunch times, human resources manager Lisa Spencer said.

"Probably we won't be doing much hiring as far as seasonal hiring," Spencer said.

Target stores plan to fill as many as 80 holiday jobs per store, including in Valparaiso, where Help Wanted signs were posted on the door, spokesman Joshua Thomas said.

"Each year, we hire between 50,000 and 80,000 additional team members," to stock shelves and man sales floors and cash registers, Thomas said.

The retail chain's hiring is consistent with previous years, Thomas said.

But with gas prices soaring and the economy slowing, 2007 promises to be unlike past years.

"It's going to be a very tough holiday season," said Richard Feinberg, of the Purdue University Retail Institute and the Center for Consumer Driven Quality.

Holiday hiring is likely to suffer.

"Stores are looking for the opportunity to maximize how much they make in every store in every region," Feinberg said. "The number-one thing they can save on is employment."

The global outplacement agency Challenger, Gray & Christmas, whose U.S. offices are based in Chicago, estimates retailers will hire 650,000 workers in the November-December period, down from 721,200 a year ago.

The consulting firm Hay Group said that based on a poll of 20 major retailers conducted in September, 26 percent of those surveyed said they plan to hire fewer workers than a year ago.

Deteriorating sales could push that up to 35 percent, the firm's vice president, Craig Rowley, said.

Sales nationwide are expected to rise 4 percent this year to $474.5 billion, representing the slowest holiday sales growth since 2002, the National Retail Federation said in its 2007 holiday forecast.

"That is not good news for retailers who have had higher costs and will have greater promotional expenses as they spend more trying to get people into stores," Feinberg said in prepared notes for his forecast.

The outlook for Indiana is brighter, according to Feinberg's 2007 holiday forecast.

The state's "personal income growth, jobs growth and lower unemployment suggest that Indiana retail sales over this season may actually be greater than the national average," Feinberg said.

Area retailers said they're optimistic about the upcoming holiday season.

"Definitely we will see a peak in traffic," Bass Pro Shops' Spencer said. "It'll be our first Christmas here. It'll be an experience."

For Target stores, "it will be a competitive season," spokesman Thomas said. "But we're well positioned to handle it."

Economic forecasters can have their say, said Phillips, the Borders store manager, "but the holidays are the holidays. We feel very positive."

The Associated Press contributed to this story.