Manager_Buying_Buying Furniture Concept.Home Centre.UAE_JAFZA_Home Centre

Role Overview

Manager, Buying – Furniture Concept, Home Centre, UAE, JAFZA. This role reports to the Merchandising Development and Buying Head at Landmark Group and owns overall business management of the assigned Furniture product category.

Role Purpose

Develop, implement and manage comprehensive business plans for the Furniture category to maximize sales and profits. Drive category growth and profitability through strategic merchandise planning, vendor management, design oversight and in-season execution across all territories.

Key Responsibilities

Category Growth and Profitability

• Drive sales from the assigned category by developing comprehensive category business plans.
• Drive and monitor gross margins for the category and ensure alignment with the organization's position, business plan and budgets.

Category Merchandise Planning

• Prepare annual plans for the assigned category and provide inputs to the Merchandising Development and Buying Head to assist in creation of overall merchandizing budget.
• Study trends from historical data around product category sales and market research to assist in the overall planning process.
• Ensure adherence to financial plan in all key areas: sales, markdowns, margin and average inventory.
• Discuss, decide and freeze the merchandise plans (pricing, promotion, assortment) for the category with the Merchandise Planning department.
• Ensure effective in-season management across territories, including stock balancing, markdown management, stock analysis and stock versus sales performance.

Category Design and Quality

• Ensure optimum utilization of customer research information to guide category management decisions, including decisions on introduction of new products, product assortment, shelf layout, promotion and pricing of products in the store.
• Formulate design and development plan in consultation with the Design Head with specifications on product features, functions, packaging and resource requirement across categories.
• Ensure all design and development activities are carried out within budget.
• Ensure the merchandise procured and received meets the quality standards.

Order and Vendor Management

• Create an adequate vendor base for the organization through active scouting and negotiation or renegotiation.
• Maintain relationships with key vendors who are critical for the long-term success of the business.
• Review the financial and credit services agreement with the key vendors in order to maximize profit and positively contribute to cash flow.
• Determine buying requirements and formulate buying plan and budget for the assigned category.
• Monitor orders based on the buying plan and follow-up to ensure merchandise delivery as per the plan based on the agreed service level agreement.
• Pursue cost reduction measures through centralized bulk buying and/or selecting appropriate vendor mix, scanning the environment for benchmarks and constantly improving the purchase process.

People Management

• Monitor team development and facilitate complaint resolution.
• Set KRAs for direct reports and conduct performance appraisal.
• Oversee staff deployment and drive motivation levels of the direct reportees.

Competition Research

• Acquire market intelligence through various sources and analyze trends which may impact the business.
• Map competition prices and products and provide qualitative inputs to the business.

Qualifications & Experience

• Post graduate or graduate qualification.
• 12+ years of relevant experience in the Home Retail Industry.