Venues Ōtautahi doubling casual workforce ahead of One New Zealand Stadium opening

Venues Ōtautahi has started recruitment to more than double its casual workforce ahead of the opening of One New Zealand Stadium in April 2026.

The Christchurch City Council event and venue management company, which will manage the stadium when it opens, opened its first round of recruitment earlier this month.

Venues Ōtautahi Chief Executive Caroline Harvie-Teare said event projections for One NZ Stadium meant they would need almost 1000 casual event staff when the venue opens.

“It’s an exciting time for our organisation as we grow in preparation for One NZ Stadium. We currently employ about 450 casual staff to service events across our portfolio of venues: the Christchurch Town Hall, Wolfbrook Arena, Hagley Oval, the Air Force Museum of New Zealand and Apollo Projects Stadium. We plan to increase that to about 990 casual staff in time for the opening of One NZ Stadium.

“We are proud to be able to provide our community so many further employment opportunities and to continue to support local in everything we do.”

She said the casual roles would be crucial for the successful operation of the stadium.

“One NZ Stadium is going to be Aotearoa, New Zealand’s premier venue and with that comes a need for a premium level of service. Our casual workforce plays a vital role in that. They are the people who interact with our guests, who set the tone of your experience at our venues, so we are looking for a quality and skilled group to add to our diverse and inclusive workforce.”

To assure we have the volume of staff needed, and we have the time to train and induct both our new members of the team so we are ready to hit the ground running when the venue opens it was critical we started this process early. The first round of recruitment for casual Event Services Attendants closes on 25 June. Further recruitment drives for the casual staff will start in September 2025 and February 2026

All Event Services Attendants work across Venues Ōtautahi’s portfolio of venues and cover a diverse range of tasks including waiting tables, bar service, working in the premium hospitality, ticket scanning, assisting with seating and providing customer service, assisting in cooking hot food, event and venue setup and brewing barista coffees.

Venues Ōtautahi General Manager – People Rachel Hewett said their training programmes were well prepared to upskill quality candidates.

“We don’t expect everyone to come in with all the skills and that is where our training programmes come in,” she said. “We employ a lot of young people. These roles are great to build confidence and provide a springboard into a thriving career in events.”

“The great thing about our wonderful portfolio of venues is we can train staff across our diverse portfolio of venues. When the Stadium nears completion, we’ll bring our casual staff into the venue for site familiarisation, so everything is seamless when we open the gates for the first event.”

While there was a lot of staff to recruit, Hewett was confident there would be plenty of quality candidates to choose from based on an overwhelming response in applications in recent recruitment.

“The last recruitment we did in December-February, we had 460 applicants,” she said. “We shortlisted, 140 top quality candidates from this pool but we could only employ 40-50. People are enthusiastic about being involved with Venues Ōtautahi and One New Zealand Stadium, so it is exciting to see.”

Along with the recruitment of casual staff, Harvie-Teare said the organisation had finalised most of its permanent staff structure ahead of the stadium’s opening with a number of roles in market or soon to be so.

“It’s an exciting time of growth for our organisation,” she said. “Over the next 12 months we’ll be expanding our staff across the company with a scalable and future-proofed framework. This recruitment ensures we are best positioned to maximise the stadium’s potential and optimise our resources.”

“It has been great to see the quality of candidates who want to join the Venues Ōtautahi team and be part of our journey. These roles are providing great opportunities to Cantabrians to contribute positively to the social, cultural, and economic fabric of our community but also attracting many talented individuals who want to move to our great city.”

Recruitment for permanent positions will continue over the next 12 months with roles ranging from venues operations and management, culinary services, technical services and assets and facilities Those interested in working for Venues Ōtautahi should keep an eye on venuesotautahi.co.nz for opportunities to apply.