Category Manager

Job Summary:

The Category Manager applies their analytical skills and business expertise to take ownership and drive growth and profitability for the category(s) while articulating a clear strategy and long-term vision. As a category expert, they will have a fundamental understanding of the products, vendors, brands and global trends driving the business. They will lead the team in evaluating, curating, pricing, promoting, and growing the brands/products in their assigned category and cultivating strong vendor partnerships that result in mutually beneficial opportunities. The role directly partners with the Director and Sr. Category Manager. As a leader on the team they will be responsible for hiring, managing, developing, and mentoring of the Buyers and Senior Buyers, and creating a cohesive, efficient and forward-thinking team. This role is the fourth step in the progression of the Merchandising team's buying structure, and is responsible for making merchandising decisions for large volume, highly visible accounts.

Job Expectations:

• The Category Manager will work closely with Senior Managers, Directors and team to implement business strategies, short and long-term growth objectives.
• Lead your Buyers to strategically negotiate with vendors to secure exceptional everyday pricing, marketing & promotional budgets, special opportunity buys, growth incentives including rebates and accruals, delivery, and payment terms for large volume, highly visible accounts.
• Manage and analyze key category metrics (KPIs) to drive solutions for category performance, new and existing brands, new products, pricing, gross margin, promotions, and product life cycle while seeking opportunities for improvement
• Continually develop and utilize strong category knowledge to build, edit and maintain current and future assortment creating market advantage while also reflecting customer needs/requests.
• Establish an action plan to capitalize on category and product innovation, industry trends, global markets, competitor offerings, consumer trends, and ways to differentiate our offering to exceed customer expectations.
• Foster relationships with large volume, highly visible existing/new vendors to drive sales, product innovation, margin growth, promotional support and maintain regular and consistent communication to ensure a clear understanding of short/long-term goals and capabilities
• Negotiation of contracts, product evaluation, quality issues, customer service questions and create and maintain supplier, product database
• Drive the new product/brand onboarding and maintenance process to ensure timely addition to market
• Calculate, maintain and evaluate cost, pricing, and product adjustments in system to ensure desired mark-ups, margin and seek strategic pricing opportunities
• Partner with Inventory Management and Planning Team in managing inventory turns, vendor forecasts, new item projections, service level, order cycles, rebate and marketing programs, special opportunity buys, and general supply chain practices
• Manage and develop short/long-term promotional activities that are profitable and highly effective in conjunction with the Marketing Team
• Create, review and utilize data/reports to enable in-depth analysis of category successes/challenges
• Comply with company policies and procedures, including safety, business ethics, and standards of conduct
• Cultivate, direct and support seasoned Buyers; enabling them to further develop and grow assigned category with tools for success

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

Required:

• Skillful, creative negotiator with long-term category development and management experience
• Intellectually curious, energetic self-starter that is highly resourceful with a can-do attitude and solid decision making skills
• Confidence to manage up, secure buy-in from senior leadership, and navigate challenging situations
• Analytical and deductive reasoning skills; stickler for processes and ability to identify needed improvements
• Entrepreneurial mindset and positive leader that is a mentor and team player/developer/builder and collaborator with strong interpersonal skills and long term vision
• Ability to operate independently, work under pressure and coordinate, organize and motivate team to meet deadlines and goals successfully with a high level of quality
• Strong organizational and project management skills; ability to manage multiple projects with competing demands for resources and meet deadlines
• Proven strength in oral/written communication skills with ability to make presentations, communicate and partner with people at all levels of the organization and with external contacts

Equipment Knowledge:

• Experience with Microsoft Office Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint)
• Experience with Google Business Suite (Gmail, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Forms) preferred
• WMS, EDI, SAP, Asana, Tableau experience a plus

Experience Requirements:

Generally, requires a minimum of seven (7) years of progressive experience in purchasing, merchandising, marketing or directly related role with equivalent responsibilities, preferably in an e-commerce environment with natural products experience a plus

Education Requirements:

Bachelor’s Degree in Business, Merchandising or related field preferred, or a combination of education and equivalent work experience. MBA a plus.

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