Merchandise Planner

This opportunity will begin remote to start and then based in either the Boston, MA or Orlando, FL corporate headquarters.

Company

A worldwide leader in endurance sports, Spartan is a high-growth, international organization that owns and operates mass-participation athletic events under the brands Spartan®, Tough Mudder®, Spartan Trail®, Hurricane Heat, and DEKA, and offers numerous related fitness, health and nutrition services and products. We create transformational experiences, products, and content to help people, companies and teams tear down boundaries and expand what they believe to be possible. Together with its many subsidiaries and licensees, Spartan combines large scale global events with a vibrant digital content and community platform. With 250 events across more than 40 countries on six continents, Spartan is the worlds leading extreme wellness and endurance brand

Spartan Race is seeking a Merchandise Planner to join its fast growing Merchandise team. This position is responsible for building and implementing planning and inventory management strategies that help achieve sales and profit objectives. This role will provide analytical, planning and forecasting support to the Senior Manager of Merchandising.

Planning and Forecasting

• Assist manager with merchandise planning and forecasting for the categories of apparel, footwear, accessories, and equipment.
• Analyze historical information and assess current business trends to develop accurate forecasts for merchandise.
• Partner with manager to develop item-level promotional and markdown strategies on a weekly and monthly basis.
• Partner with manager to plan, forecast and achieve inventory goals by monitoring aged goods and turn results, providing stock productivity analysis, and thru the creation of an overall stock strategy for the business unit.
• Participate as a functional planning representative on cross-functional project teams as assigned.
• Develop and maintain strong vendor partnerships. Collaborate with vendors to ensure availability and timely delivery of merchandise.
• Collaborate with Operations Specialist to execute purchase orders according to vendor timelines.
• Analyze sales by channel to ensure appropriate balance of inventory across all warehouse locations.
• Analyze historical sales data to build accurate forecasts by size, color, category.
• Replenish key items on a regular basis to maintain consistent and optimal stock levels.
• Develop and manage relationships with third party logistics and various warehouse locations.

Allocation & Assortment Planning

• Facilitate the allocation of product to Spartans events both in the US & globally, to the Ecommerce business for global & US platforms, and for wholesale distribution to any US retail partners as well as global licensees.
• Analyze historical sales data and current business trends to develop accurate forecasts and appropriate product assortments for merchandise sold at Spartan races.
• Come up with creative allocation strategies that optimize sales and inventory turn at Spartan races.
• Work with manager to allocate and plan for clearance sales at select Spartan races.
• Manage the buying and planning of venue products designed specifically for each Spartan race.
• Adhere to allocation and planning timelines to ensure timely delivery of product to each Spartan race.

Reporting and Analytics

• Assist merchandising team with weekly and monthly demand and sales reporting.
• Reconcile sales data from Spartan Race events as well as the ecommerce website.
• Work directly with manager to build new reports and merchandise analytics.
• Analyze historical and current trends to identify risk and opportunities.
• Drive Quarterly reporting analytics for Senior Management.
• Report on monthly sales for all key sponsors.
• Help to ensure data integrity across all systems.

Qualifications

• Bachelors Degree required (preferred focus in areas such as Business, Merchandising, or Marketing).
• Able to work independently as well as part of a team.
• Entrepreneurial and comfortable developing new processes and tools.
• Capable of analyzing business trends to successfully plan, forecast and direct change.
• Must be extremely organized and detail oriented. Excels at adhering to timelines.
• Thrives in a fast-paced environment with short timelines and changing priorities.
• Clear, efficient verbal and written communication skills.
• Comfortable working across various teams and interacting with all levels of an organization.
• Creative problem solver who works well in a team-based environment.
• Business knowledge of retail and merchandising concepts.
• Comfortable with Supply Chain logistics.
• Basic understanding of key distribution channels retail events, ecommerce, and wholesale.
• 3-5 years of work experience in retail planning, allocation, buying or merchandise analytics.
• Successful track record and reputation for exceeding performance expectations.
• Experience with merchandise allocation or store planning.
• Advanced analytical skills.
• Advanced knowledge of Microsoft Excel.
• Travel to event(s) required by all Staff