EMPLOYMENT opportunities in Barrow are on the up, data suggests.

Employment in Barrow has always been centred in production, but with the growth of the retail sector, and with more shops and fast-food restaurants opening up, employment in Barrow could be changing to reflect this.

In July 2021 the government said there were 31,000 jobs at workplaces in Barrow.

With the manufacturing sector accounting for the greatest proportion (29 per cent), nearly four times the national average, largely as a result of the BAE Systems shipyard and associated businesses.

Nomis official labour market statistic showed that public administration, education & health accounts for a further 27.4 per cent, as the Furness General Hospital is an important part of the town.

Followed by wholesale & retail (14.5 per cent) as Barrow has seen an increase in the number of shops, fast-food stops and supermarkets in recent years.

Currently, the figures nomis displays show that while 26,500 people in Barrow are employed and 1,100 are unemployed however the percentage of unemployment in the town is consistant with the statistics across Britain.

Recently, according to online apps, the jobs available tend to be more centred on hospitality. Job sites show a great number of places looking for servers, wait-staff and store assistants.

The online job application site, Totaljobs, reports 7,063 jobs within 10 miles of Barrow available right now.

There are 703 temporary jobs and 737 part-time jobs in Barrow, but people in the area prefer to look for BAE Systems, NHS or Admin jobs.

Online employers are seeking a wide range of employees, from senior designers at electrical outsource UK Limited to physiotherapists and wait-staff, theres places for engineers in BAE and a supervisor in Aldi, but the most intriguing advertisment online was for a mystery shopper.

Serve Legal in Barrow is recruiting compliance auditors called "mystery shoppers" to visit a range of sites.

Mystery shoppers are people employed to visit a shop or restaurant incognito in order to assess the quality of the goods or services.

These audits can be to supermarkets, bars and betting shops where the Serve Legal employee is required to and report back on a specific compliance issue. They particularly require 18 and 19 year olds for age-verification related work, but have work for all ages over 16.