What are the responsibilities and job description for the Director - Category Insights position at Grocery Outlet?
About Grocery Outlet:
- Our Mission: Touching lives for the better
- Our Vision: Touching lives by being the first choice for bargain-minded consumers in the U.S.
- Our Values & Behaviors: Achievement, Diversity, Entrepreneurship, Family, Fun, Integrity & Service
About the Team:
Our Purchasing team’s mission is to create a distinctively curated assortment to WOW our existing customers with everyday available value, unique offerings and seasonal solutions to further enhance our in-store treasure hunt experience. We strategically identify white space within categories to add value, analyzing data, partnering with internal stakeholders and external suppliers, to make key strategic decisions across business departments. Our passion and energy promote a creative and growth-oriented environment within the unique culture of Grocery Outlet. The members of our team are resourceful, critical thinkers making fact-based recommendations that pride themselves on integrity, efficiency, and collaboration. We utilize best in class category leadership practices to uncover unique value in our business, working closely with both our Independent Operator community as well as our Purchasing and Planning teams.
About the Role:
Reports to the Vice President of GO Brands and Category Leadership and is a new role to Grocery Outlet. This specific role will be responsible for implementing category management best practices including but not limited to pricing strategies, Price Pack Architecture (PPA), macro space planning, assortment optimization, promotional performance analysis and market basket size evaluations and recommendations. This dynamic individual is responsible for leading the category insights efforts across all of our business departments, by developing a toolkit of solutions, partnering with key stakeholders in Purchasing and Planning, and then executing the rollout of those solutions across business departments. This role is a unique opportunity to join a new team chartered with developing the foundation and future of Category Leadership at Grocery Outlet.
Responsibilities Include:
- Develop and then implement short, medium, and long-term category management plans and category sourcing strategies across the business for both retail supplies business and select GO Brands categories.
- Conduct industry analyses and competitive assessments, modeling opportunities to prioritize white space sales and/or margin opportunities that would drive incremental value to the company.
- Lead and manage the RFP process for the supply of Retail Supplies and certain GO Brands categories, partnering with key business owners from start to finish, identifying capable supplier partners, performing market research and benchmarking, and managing the supplier communication process.
- Lead contract and business term negotiations with preferred suppliers by utilizing a robust strategic sourcing process, focused on should-costs, leveraging advanced scenario modeling, design to value thinking and vertical interference concepts.
- Develop business recommendations and present them to business leaders for decision-making, including the Purchasing Leadership Team and our Independent Operators network.
- Execute legal contracts with awarded suppliers, partnering with the Grocery Outlet legal team on all legal indemnifications and business terms and conditions.
- Monitor supplier performance, assessing supplier service levels, understanding capacity planning, reviewing innovation pipelines, and pressing for continuous cost improvements.
- Perform ad hoc category or business analysis and support for stakeholders across the company, becoming a key thought partner with the business.
- Create and commercialize new GO products, collaborating with the Purchasing team category leads and suppliers to ensure products are meeting targeted quality expectations and delivering excellent value to our shoppers and stores.
- Direct the GO Brands design agency towards a packaging design solution for each identified category, considering category drivers, national brand activity and private label competitive positioning.
- Review and approve label claim documentation, quality certifications, specifications, plant audit reports, certificates of insurance and other legal or regulatory documents to manage risk for the company.
- Create sales and marketing content for planned digital marketing events, including Ads, seasonal events, promotional activities, industry activation and ad hoc Independent Operator needs.
- Effectively manage the GO Brands portfolio within assigned departments to ensure comp sales growth and enhanced margin performance while continuing to offer value to our shoppers.
- Develop and refine over time Grocery Outlet’s GO Brands vision, processes, and tools to ensure a best-in-class private label business.
About You:
- Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Business, Food Science, Economics or Supply Chain. MBA preferred.
- 10 years of category management experience required in either retailing or food service, familiar with all disciplines of category management including pricing strategies, Price Pack Architecture (PPA), efficient assortment selection, promotional market basket analysis and product lifecycle management and efficient assortment selection. Experience in grocery retail highly preferred.
- Ideal candidate with also have 10 years of experience working with syndicated retail data, capable of analyzing multiple reporting formats to decipher optimal insights for our targeted shoppers.
- Action-oriented, self-starter with courage to lead change, and implement operational improvements, including category leadership best practices.
- Strategic and structured thinker—ability to quickly understand sales drivers in a business, develop strategic frameworks, then leverage to prioritize opportunities.
- Strong analytical capabilities—takes data driven approach to problems with an ability to quickly model financial impacts and identify opportunities. Advanced Excel skills required.
- Collaborative worker—quickly builds trusted relationships with internal business partners and external suppliers and able to leverage third party industry data along with manufacturer supplied data.
- Possess the ability to multi-task, prioritize, work independently and keep a high level of focus.
- Excellent interpersonal, written and verbal communication skills, especially in front of peers and executive audiences. Strong PowerPoint skills required.
- Experience working within a mainframe ERP system a plus as well as multiple data sources.