Director, Category Leadership, Walmart

Coca-Cola•Rogers, AR

4d•Onsite

About The Position

The Coca-Cola Category Leadership team is seeking a highly skilled, strategic category advisor to support the Walmart business. This role is responsible for building trusted merchant relationships, translating complex data into clear recommendations, and leading category strategies that strengthen assortment, space, modular execution, and shopper-focused decision-making. As a Director, Category Leadership, you will combine technical capability, customer partnership, people leadership, and objective category expertise to help Walmart merchants identify growth opportunities and make informed decisions across the beverage category.

Requirements

5+ years of experience in CPG, retail, category management, shopper insights, business analytics, or related field
Experience developing customer-facing category recommendations for a major retailer, with Walmart experience strongly preferred
Strong knowledge of category management principles, space management, assortment strategy, shopper behavior, and analytic techniques
Experience translating data into customer-facing recommendations, presentations, and category stories
Proficiency in Power BI, Alteryx, Excel, and AI-enabled analytics is essential.
Strong familiarity with Walmart Scintilla, Nielsen, Circana, Numerator, shopper/panel data, data hierarchies, and the nuances of using multiple data sources to develop category recommendations.
Strong analytical and problem-solving skills with the ability to interpret complex data, identify patterns, and translate insights into practical actions.
Excellent verbal, written, and visual communication skills with the ability to simplify complex analysis, build compelling presentations, and influence stakeholders at multiple levels.
Demonstrated ability to build and maintain strong merchant relationships by understanding customer needs, anticipating questions, and delivering objective category recommendations.
High attention to detail at both breadth and depth, with the ability to manage multiple priorities, timelines, data sets, and stakeholder expectations.
Integrity, objectivity, and commitment to confidentiality
Insatiable curiosity and comfort navigating ambiguity
Strong merchant partnership and customer-first orientation
Tenacious drive for process improvement, automation, and capability building
Willingness to respectfully challenge conventional thinking with fact-based recommendations
Proactive engagement across internal teams, customer stakeholders, and cross-functional partners
Currently authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis and must not require The Coca-Cola Company's sponsorship to continue to work legally in the United States.

Nice To Haves

7+ years of experience in CPG, retail, category management, shopper insights, business analytics, or related field
Experience serving in or directly supporting a Walmart category advisor role
Experience using Walmart Scintilla or similar customer data platforms to develop category recommendations
Experience across multiple disciplines beyond category management, such as shopper insights, space planning, advanced analytics, customer strategy, or omnichannel
MBA or other graduate degree
Experience with SQL or scalable data automation is a plus.
Experience with JDA/Blue Yonder, Cantactix/Mission Control, planogram development, assortment analysis, modular resets, space-to-sales, regionality, aisle flow, and post-reset measurement is a plus.

Responsibilities

Utilize Power BI, Alteryx, AI-enabled capabilities, Excel, and other analytics tools to analyze complex data sets, build dashboards, automate recurring reporting, and deliver clear visuals for customer-facing stakeholders.
Collect, clean, combine, and maintain data to ensure accuracy and reliability across reporting and analysis. Leverage Walmart Scintilla, Nielsen, Numerator, shopper/panel data, internal data sources, and other relevant tools to identify category opportunities and support merchant recommendations.
Serve as a trusted category advisor and primary point of contact for Walmart merchants, understanding both tactical and strategic needs to deliver tailored recommendations, support strategic planning conversations, and influence decisions through objective, fact-based category expertise.
Develop fact-based insights that connect category trends, shopper behavior, consumer dynamics, competitive activity, innovation, and performance results into cohesive assortment and space recommendations. Translate complex analysis into clear, compelling stories that drive action with merchants and senior stakeholders.
Partner closely with internal teams across space, shopper insights, advanced analytics, and omnichannel to align category strategies, support Walmart merchant priorities, and ensure recommendations are connected across store and digital shopping experiences.
Stay current on industry trends, Walmart tools, category management best practices, automation, AI-enabled analytics, and data visualization approaches to improve processes, reporting, datasets, and decision support capabilities.
Lead assortment and modular reset recommendations, including SKU optimization, space-to-sales analysis, regionality, aisle flow, adjacency strategy, white-space discovery, planograms, and post-reset performance tracking.
Maintain objectivity, confidentiality, and high ethical standards when handling customer, competitive, supplier, and category-sensitive information. Ensure recommendations are unbiased, category-first, and aligned with Walmart’s expectations for trusted category advisorship.