Despite a tough economy, there were plenty of opportunities available Thursday at the Montana State University job fair.

MSU's 22nd annual career fair was held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. with more than 120 employers signed up for the event. Some of the companies included Boeing, the FDIC, RightNow Technologies, the USDA, Barnard Construction, GE Energy, Land O' Lakes, Kraft Foods, Printing for Less, Chevron, Bresnan Communications, and many government agencies, according to Career, Internship and Student Employment Services Director Carina Beck.

Many employers were looking for people with engineering and computer skills. Those in attendance included a lot of national companies, the military and some large infrastructure construction companies all looking for engineers, designers, software developers and a variety of technical skills.   

A few local companies were on hand, using interesting means to attract the attention of students.

"The last 18 months were tough on every sort of business, especially ours that works extensively with small businesses around the country, but we are seeing those businesses come back and refocus some of their marketing efforts. We found our friend Harry here in the human resources department. He was looking for opportunity and we put him to work. He's pretty good on a computer considering he doesn't have much bone structure in his hands," said Marne Reed, vice president of human resources for PrintingForLess.

The company's Bigfoot mascot accompanied the PrintingForLess team to the job fair. While finding a job may be difficult to find, the mascot serves as a reminder that "legendary jobs do exist in today's economy," according to a news release from the company.

PrintingForLess expects to hire a half dozen new people next quarter.

- Mark Martello reporting for Z7 in Bozeman