Category Analyst II
About The Position
Kohler Co. is seeking an analytical candidate with strong business acumen and a passion for driving results to join a Kitchen & Bath category team. The Category Analyst II owns increasingly complex portions of category management and business execution, turning market, customer, financial, operational, and competitive data into recommendations that help Product Managers, Directors, and Category Leaders make decisions. The role supports multiple Product Managers and owns recurring business processes and operating rhythms. It is a development step toward future Product Management responsibilities, building decision-making capability and business ownership within defined areas. The position is onsite in Kohler, Wisconsin, four days per week, and involves approximately 10–20% annual travel to Kohler manufacturing locations, customers, and the market. Applicants must be authorized to work in the United States without requiring sponsorship now or in the future.
Requirements
- Bachelor's degree required.
- At least 2 years of experience with a track record of high performance in an analytical or business-facing role.
- Proficiency in Excel and comfort working with large data sets, reporting tools, and AI tools.
- Strong written, verbal, and presentation skills.
- Ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams.
- Curiosity, creative thinking, accountability for outcomes, and initiative to find solutions and work effectively with all levels of the organization.
- Authorization to work in the United States without requiring sponsorship now or in the future.
Nice To Haves
- Exposure to category management, product management, demand planning, supply chain, analytics, finance, or commercial analytics.
- Working knowledge of new product development, channel marketing, manufacturing, forecasting, production planning, and category business management.
Responsibilities
- Own recurring business processes and analytical responsibilities for assigned portions of the category.
- Translate customer, channel, financial, and operational signals into actionable business recommendations.
- Develop scenario analyses, options, and recommended actions to support Product Managers and Directors.
- Lead assigned topics during demand planning, pricing, supply, inventory, and category performance reviews.
- Recommend forecast assumptions, inventory actions, promotional activity, pricing opportunities, and portfolio priorities within established business guidelines.
- Track key business actions and help resolve cross-functional issues.
- Build comprehensive unit forecasts for assigned product lines and recommend business actions, projecting the first-order impact of promotions, load-ins, load-outs, and customer inventory changes.
- Analyze point-of-sale, shipment, order, and weeks-of-stock data and turn findings into forecast recommendations and clear team summaries.
- Project inventory levels, anticipate supply shortages and excess, and raise issues early so cross-functional teams can address root causes.
- Apply available levers to adjust future inventory position in support of new product introductions, discontinuations, and service performance.
- Conduct category pricing analysis using price elasticity principles and project future elasticity impacts from historical data.
- Perform break-even analysis on the sales and margin impact of discounts and promotional plans, and track results against plan.
- Complete dollar forecasting and sales performance analysis, recommending actions and quantifying expected impacts on sales, margin, inventory, and service performance.
- Monitor performance against key indicators and benchmarks, and assess portfolio effectiveness to identify improvement opportunities.
- Gather customer and consumer feedback using quantitative and qualitative methods, independently and with supporting teams, and distill it into actionable category insights.
- Gather and analyze competitive data and trends and translate findings into business recommendations.
- Maintain current competitive and market information, including product catalogs, price lists, promotions, and new product introductions.
- Compile reports and communicate findings and insights clearly to cross-functional partners and leadership.
- Partner with Product Management to align demand, supply, customer, and financial signals with the product plan.
- Pressure-test assumptions in launch plans, discontinuations, promotions, and category initiatives.
- Collaborate with Channel Marketing to execute new product launch plans and current portfolio programming.
Benefits
- Day 1 access to applicable benefit programs, with no waiting period.
- Competitive total rewards package supporting health and wellbeing.
- Access to career growth and development opportunities.
- Performance bonus/variable incentive compensation.
- Diverse and inclusive workplace.
Stand Out From the Crowd
Upload your resume and get instant feedback on how well it matches this job.
What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Mid Level
