Retail / Lifestyle / Fashion / Accessories / Home & Gifting
5-7 years
About The Role
We are looking for an Assistant Manager / Manager - Buying & Retail Merchandising who will be responsible for selecting the right products, planning the right quantities and ensuring the right merchandise reaches the right stores at the right time.
The role will work closely with Design, Product, Sourcing, Supply Chain, Visual Merchandising and Retail teams to improve sales, margins, inventory movement and overall product performance across stores.
Key Responsibilities
- Buying & Range Planning
- Plan the seasonal product assortment based on sales trends, customer preferences and business
requirements.
- Decide the right product mix, quantity, price points and category mix for each season.
- Analyse past sales performance to understand what products should be repeated, refreshed or
discontinued.
- Identify gaps in the current assortment and recommend new products or categories.
- Work closely with Design and Product teams while finalising new collections and ranges.
- Vendor & Purchase Management
- Identify and work with suitable vendors and suppliers.
- Negotiate costs, MOQs, margins, lead times and commercial terms.
- Ensure product costings and margins are in line with business expectations.
- Coordinate purchase orders and closely track production and delivery timelines.
- Work with Sourcing, Quality and Supply Chain teams to ensure products reach stores on time and meet required quality standards.
- Retail Merchandising & Allocation
- Ensure every store carries the right merchandise based on its size, location, customer profile and sales
potential.
- Work with the planning/allocation team on store-wise product allocation and replenishment.
- Ensure adequate stock availability of key and fast-moving products.
- Monitor store-level inventory and identify overstocking, understocking and slow-moving merchandise.
- Regularly interact with Store Managers and Regional Managers to understand customer feedback and store requirements.
- Sales & Inventory Management
- Track weekly sales, inventory, sell-through and category performance.
- Identify best sellers, slow movers and non-performing products.
- Take timely actions such as reordering fast-moving products, moving stock between stores, recommending markdowns and managing RTVs where required.
- Ensure healthy inventory levels while minimising ageing and excess stock.
- Seasonal & Store Planning
- Prepare seasonal buying plans based on store demographics, category performance, price points,
consumer preferences and new collection launches.
- Support annual planning for sales, units, margins and inventory.
- Work with Visual Merchandising teams to ensure important collections and products are displayed
effectively.
- Support merchandising requirements for new store openings.
- Market & Consumer Understanding
- Regularly visit stores and competitor brands to understand market trends.
- Track competitor products, pricing, assortment and new launches.
- Understand customer preferences and share relevant insights with Design, Product and Sourcing teams.
- Recommend changes in future collections based on actual product and store performance.
Key Skills Required
- Strong understanding of Buying, Merchandising and Retail Planning.
- Good commercial understanding of sales, margins, inventory and sell-through.
- Strong analytical and numerical skills.
- Very good working knowledge of Excel.
- Ability to understand customer and market trends.
- Strong negotiation and vendor-management skills.
- Ability to work closely with multiple teams including Design, Sourcing, Retail, Supply Chain and VM.
- Strong follow-up and execution skills.
Experience
- 5-7 years of experience in Buying / Merchandising / Retail Merchandising.
- Experience with a recognised fashion, accessories, lifestyle, home, gifting or consumer retail brand
preferred.
- Candidates who have handled both buying and store-level merchandising/planning will be preferred.
- Previous exposure to front-end retail or store operations will be an added advantage.
Education
- Graduate in Fashion Merchandising, Retail Management, Business Management or a related field.
- Candidates from NIFT or similar institutes will be preferred.
Ideal Candidate
We are looking for someone who is commercially strong and understands both the product side and the
store/customer side of retail.
Skills: retail,home accessories,lifestyle,sourcing,buying,merchandising
