Job Description:

Job Summary

Reporting to the Vice President, Merchandising, the Manager, Merchandising Strategy is responsible for standardizing and imbedding merchandising strategic framework into the overall corporate annual planning process, leading Divisional, Departmental and Category level strategic planning, to support delivery of our annual financial targets and long-term growth.

Key Responsibilities

Strategy Development

• Continuously analyze market conditions, competitive circumstances, and available data to develop appropriate sales solutions. Regularly report results to the leadership team, ensuring alignment with the company's strategic priorities.
• Act as a strategic thought leader, providing data-driven insights and identifying opportunities to drive sales, share, and profit growth.
• Actively participate in development of VP and Director level merchandising strategies and key strategic initiatives, while educating and supporting category managers in the development of category level strategies and associated tactics that improve our competitive position and accelerate financial performance., utilizing standardized documentations and approach across the entire merchandising team
• Track and analyse market share results to evaluate category strategies, determine drivers of outperformance, and diagnose underperformance at the banner and category levels.
• Provide merchants suggestions on signing, fixtures and product placement, assortment and pricing analysis, and key recommendation on how to improve their overall category success.
• Partner with merchants and space planners to Integrate strategies into assortment planning decision making and ultimate planogram and POP designs
• Collaborate closely with the Marketing, Corporate and Franchise Operations, and Supply Chain to ensure strategic plans are executable in current environment, and if there are gaps, identify and propose solutions required to bring strategies to life.

Strategic Initiative Support

• Develop tangible metrics to measure success of strategic initiatives ensuring performance is tracking towards targets and translating results into actionable, strategic next steps.
• Create reports and conduct large data set analysis surrounding pilot program results; engage data driven insights and financial impact with Category and Senior Leadership.
• Design and develop program/project presentations to key executive stakeholders within the business.
• Integrate analysis and targets for Proprietary Brands in the overall category strategic planning and design
• This role has to have an ability to influence a decision-making at Category Manager, Director and even VP and CMO levels, and hence needs to have had on hand experienced in the merchandising environment. (preferably2-3 years of Category Manager experience)

Quarterly and Annual Planning

• Ensure seamless integration of the annual strategic planning with the Annual Financial planning cycle
• Collaborate with Category teams to ensure category strategies are developed to support divisional annual plan and have sales building blocks identified to deliver on plan
• Ensure seamless integration of strategic planning into the annual planning cycle, prebook calendar and the Planogram Reset schedule

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Business, Marketing, or a related field
• 2-3 Years of Category Management experience preferable
• 1-2 Years of Merchandising Strategy design or similar
• Strong financial and analytical acumen with ability to drive insights and recommend solutions
• Strong negotiation, organization and communication skills.
• Ability to work collaboratively across departments to achieve shared objectives.
• Experience in influencing upwards and lateral

Skills:

• Strategic thinking, with ability to derive tactical design to deliver on plan
• Data Analysis
• Strategic Deck designs
• Financial Acumen
• Process Improvement and design; project management
• Cross-functional Collaboration

Working Conditions:

Full-time role with limited travel to the Head Office and Mock Store at the Brampton DC.