Merchandise Planner

$85,000 - $110,000/Yr

Forever 21 - Los Angeles, CA

Full-time - Senior

Los Angeles, CA

251-500 employees

Clothing, Clothing Accessories, Shoe, and Jewelry Retailers

About the position

The Merchandise Planner at Forever 21 is responsible for developing strategic merchandise plans for assigned product categories to maximize sales and meet financial objectives. This role involves analyzing sales trends and forecasts, leading open-to-buy meetings, and providing analytical support to ensure the achievement of sales, gross margin, and key financial goals.

Responsibilities

• Manage the development of annual, seasonal, monthly, and weekly merchandise plans for assigned product categories
• Partner with merchants to develop and propose business tactics in response to current business trends, advising them on open-to-buy, optimum unit purchasing, etc.
• Develop multiple class level pricing recommendations and strategies in alignment with company financial objectives
• Forecast the sales levels of store clusters based on historical sales trends and insights on fashion trends received from Buying groups
• Develop and evaluate unit plans, projections, inventory flow, and seasonal sell-off plans
• Develop projections and inventory flow for key items and collections
• Analyze and assess the sales performance of assigned product categories; revise in-season plans accordingly to maximize sales and profitability
• Partner with the Allocation team to develop and implement seasonal strategies according to region, climate, and other associated variables
• Routinely present recommendations and other analysis to senior leadership and executive management related to driving short and long-term business goals including hind-sights, color/pattern selling, etc.

Requirements

• Must have a BABS degree; Finance, Operations, Retail Management, Business Management or an analytical focus is strongly preferred
• Must have 5-7 years of experience in retail merchandise planning; 2-3 years of experience in a lead or supervisory role is preferred
• Intermediate proficiency in Microsoft Excel required, including v-lookups, pivot tables, and basic macros; Must be able to manipulate large quantities of data in Microsoft Excel to drive business decisions
• Must have excellent time-management and organization skills
• Must be able to effectively communicate, written and orally, with all levels of employees

Benefits

• Free parking
• Paid holidays
• On-site gym
• 401(k)
• Paid time off
• Employee discount
• Flexible schedule