Merchandise Planning Manager | E-commerce Apparel & Fashion Industry

jingus

Merchandise Planning Manager | E-commerce Apparel & Fashion Industry

Please send resume to career@jingus.com

Key Responsibilities:
· Work cross functionally with other departments within the company in order to optimize buy targets, sku optimization, as well as time phased category plans. Work closely with Inventory coworker and Product teams. Monitoring Open to Buy flow for current buying season and an extended 12 month strategic open to buy plan for future product seasons. Monitor and advice regarding aged inventory and potential future aged inventory.
· Executing merchandise assortment plan that supports the financial and merchandising objectives set by the management.
· Create and update inventory productivity analysis including stock aging, velocity, flow optimization, and seasonal mix.
· Guides the creation of original dollar by merchandise category: sales, margins, markdown, and inventory productivity.
· Partners with marketing department on the planning of margins, markdown, discounts, promotions, events, and advertisement.
· Attending trade shows and conferences to stay abreast of industry standards.
· Analyzing sales reports, communicating histories and trends, and creating action plans for slow moving categories, and heavy inventory
· Regularly reviewing assortment performance, react quickly to market changes, and make sure current assortment is competitive
· Continually seeks to improve the online experience by researching and staying abreast of new and innovative online solutions and capabilities; key competitor actions; industry trends and emerging customer and market needs.
· Using your fashion knowledge and quantitative skills to select the right product mix and the right inventory level to maximize profit.
· Manage in-season inventory activities, forecasting to a roll forward projection, and adjusting based on the agreed top down plan. Maintain communication with Inventory team on outputs, by creating and updating ad hoc reporting, monitoring results. Support the markdown and closeout process.
· Manage the markdown in season and closeout/end of life process.
· Exhibits market awareness at both the high and low pricing spectrum, staying abreast of the most current fashion trends and pricing strategies- for both apparel and non-apparel.
· Knowledge of fabrics, trims, manufacturing, construction, and quality.
· Helps merchant team line plan a season to design and production, requesting appropriate levels of bestselling items and new fashion ideas.
· Creates successful product lines with balanced assortment, design, and gross margin each season.
· Manages open-to-buy for the entire division, staying within inventory and markup requirements. Flexes categories for chase and to limit liability as necessary.
· Works with planning to roll up divisional financial buy targets by season and is pro-active to adjust buy strategy when needed.
· Own product life cycle, managing launches, and merchandising plans
· Coordinate inter-departmental initiatives to align teams on your evolving merchandising plan
· Oversee the online store look and feel to strike the perfect balance between brand creative, storytelling, and an easy path-to-purchase for our customers
· Monitor costs and pricing integrity to ensure appropriate margins are maintained; monitor price consistency among vendors and the accomplishment of profitability marketing campaigns
· Assesses the competitive landscape by examining merchandising strategies of key competitors and best-in-class online retailers to understand emerging online trends and recommend changes to the online category strategy based on customer and competitor insights; brand strategies; analysis of KPIs (e.g., sales, conversion, in-stock levels, and assortment alignment, color, price range, categories) and category or product-specific promotions.

Qualifications and Education Requirements:
· Mandarin & English bilingual required.
· Advanced proficiency with Excel experience with VLOOKUPs and Pivot Tables.
· Minimum 5 years of merchandising, inventory planning, allocation, purchasing, forecasting or analysis experience (Apparel & Fashion industry requires).
· You know how to use Shopify backend, ERP System to get data you need.
· You are knowledgeable of current fashion and market trends.
· You have strong background in e-commerce.
· You are proficient in Microsoft Office programs such as Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
· You will minimize the production (cost effective along with quality fabrics and accessories outsourcing)
· You will provide on time delivery to the production line and make a Strategically production Plan
· Along with Production Manager in China to ensure finish product as per client quality standard.
· You have extensive retail experience and excellent negotiation skills.
· You have strong verbal and written communication skills.
· You have a positive attitude, amazing work ethic and obsessive attention to detail.