Manager, Sales Planning-East

Kinder's•Walnut Creek, CA

9d•$135,000 - $155,000•Hybrid

About The Position

The Manager, Sales Planning – East serves as a key commercial leader responsible for driving the integration of sales, demand, and inventory planning across the organization, focusing on the Eastern Region of Grocery. This role is part of a high-performing team that partners cross-functionally with Sales, Brand, Finance, and Operations to deliver accurate forecasts, optimize trade investment, and improve customer inventory health. The Manager ensures that Kinder’s commercial plans are data-driven, strategically aligned, and executed to support sustainable growth and operational efficiency.

Requirements

Bachelor’s Degree required; MBA or related advanced degree preferred.
5+ years of progressive experience in Sales Planning, Demand Planning, or Commercial Analytics—preferably within CPG or Food & Beverage.
Experience with major grocery retailers is a plus.
Proven experience managing complex annual planning and forecasting cycles.
Strong business acumen with experience collaborating across Sales, Finance, Supply Chain, and IT.
Proficiency with trade promotion management systems (Exceedra, Confido, or similar) and intermediate Excel or BI tools; SAP Business One knowledge is a plus.

Nice To Haves

MBA or related advanced degree preferred.
Experience with major grocery retailers is a plus.
SAP Business One knowledge is a plus.

Responsibilities

Lead the development of sales and demand plans, aligning volume, revenue, and trade investment targets with company strategy.
Drive the end-to-end planning calendar, ensuring alignment and timely input from cross-functional partners including brand, sales, planning, and finance.
Challenge assumptions and elevate the analytical rigor of commercial plans through data-driven insights and scenario modeling.
Build team capabilities in forecasting, analytics, and cross-functional communication.
Create a collaborative and performance-driven environment that emphasizes continuous improvement and proactive problem-solving.
Own divisional monthly sales forecast accuracy and integration into the Demand Planning process.
Manage cross-functional forecasting reviews, ensuring timely updates reflecting current market dynamics, customer performance, and promotional shifts.
Partner with Finance to ensure forecast alignment with financial targets and strategic objectives for revenues, trade spend, and total promotional spend.
Oversee post-event analysis and ROI evaluation for trade and promotional spend; analyzes total trade investment for partners include trade spend, marketing spend, slotting, and additional promotional activity.
Identify opportunities to improve trade and total investment spend efficiency and recommend reallocation strategies to maximize growth and profitability.
Support Trade Finance teams with integration of sales plans, trade planners, and trade promotional tools during annual promotional planning; monitor promotional tools for promotional alignment with sales strategy and planning.
Monitor customer-level inventory performance, driving proactive actions to prevent out-of-stocks or overstocks.
Develop and maintain real-time dashboards and visibility tools for internal and external stakeholders.
Partner with Supply Chain to ensure sales and operations alignment, supporting service level and inventory health goals.
Anticipate inventory requirements for new items based upon historical sales performance of similar items, promotion analysis, and customer loading needs.
Design and implement scalable processes, tools, and templates for sales planning, forecasting, and performance tracking.
Partner with IT and Data teams to enhance system capabilities (e.g., TPM, ERP, BI tools).
Standardize reporting and establish key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure and improve commercial planning effectiveness.
Serve as a liaison between Sales and cross-functional leadership, ensuring commercial plans are cohesive and actionable.
Provide leadership with data-driven insights into sales execution, trade effectiveness, and forecast risk.
Partner in executive-level presentations and represent the Sales Planning function in strategic business reviews.