Regional Merchandising Manager - Chicago/Woodridge, IL at WALGREENS

Job Summary

The Regional Merchandising Manager (RMM) serves as the liaison between corporate and regional operations and the first point of contact for all merchandising support for assigned areas. The RMM provides merchandising expertise, making product assortment decisions, managing all local vendors and regional sourcing, negotiating regional items and promotions, generating incremental regional funding (as applicable and within company guidelines), driving new product introductions (including Tier A corporate launches), managing DSD service levels and facilitating category reset/revisions as needed. Responsible for meeting sales and profit targets specific to their region and vendors.

Job Responsibilities

• Responsible for supporting region specific customer, category and product strategies to drive sales and profit within an assigned region and store clusters. Responsible for all local pricing and marketing as established by corporate guidance. Collaborates with Localization team to drive synergies and create efficiencies.
• Responsible for analyzing reports to identify regional category sales gaps (vs corporate performance) and building regional plans to drive volume in opportunistic categories. Supports regional opportunities by understanding customer needs and current financial performance. Shares OpStudy performance gaps and assists in creating performance solutions.
• Manages all aspects of regional vendors including negotiation of all promotions and funding. Develops regional vendor budget targets and service level expectations based on corporate growth targets. Obtains lowest cost of goods on all local products bought and sold into the region. May create advertising opportunities in the region through negotiations with vendors. Focuses significant time and effort on top eight national DSD vendors to drive category sales year over year and to align with corporate growth plans.
• Works closely with Merchandising management and regional leadership in establishing goals and objectives for each region. Responsible for achieving the budgeted market sales and profit goals for front end for the region. Provides business cases, reporting and score-carding to ensure decisions are fact-based for all regional activities. Executes national programs on a regional level.
• Serves as Operations/Local Merchandising’s first point of contact for assigned categories. Category responsibility may range from developing category strategy and managing category/region P&L to executing corporately developed plans. Emphasis on op-study performance drives improvement through collaboration with Category Management teams and operations.
• Acts as a lead role in store format merchandising development and execution. Closely aligned with format team, working to refine assortments.
• Score-cards regional item performance to determine viability for discontinuance or expansion for key local items. Determines if regional items have net profitability and ROI. For items with national expansion or planogrammed opportunities, the RMM will work through the SME on execution parameters.
• Negotiates with internal and external service providers (distributors) to secure resources and acceptable service level agreements. Manages opportunities where suppliers are engaged for grand openings and closings.
• Assists Retail Pricing Coordinator to ensure effective management of regional vendors through catalog/pricing maintenance and the capture of all regional promotions and deals.
• Partners with various business leads to ensure achievement of agreed results. Partners with the business unit DMM’s to communicate local mix and programs associated with driving sales in all markets. Manages regional pricing as applicable based on corporate category parameters and guardrails. Partners with Regional leadership to develop and create regional Charitable Giving strategy. Partners with Supply Chain to plan, identify and correct inventory needs and opportunities. Responsible for maintaining an accurate recap of significant regional events which impact inventory needs. Partners and collaborates with regional cross-functional team which includes Finance, Asset Protection, Human Resources, and Facilities Management to drive region sales and profitability.
• Coaches, mentors and develops pool of talent from the field to be knowledgeable in product mix, assortment profitability, advertising and selling to their regional customers.
• Performs competitive store visits to understanding assortment, pricing, promotional and vendor opportunities.
• Serves as Brand Ambassadors for the WAG brand, communicating brand standards to internal and external partners. Ensures merchandising beliefs are consistently applied, brand guidelines are being upheld and corporate marketing programs are executed with excellence.

An Equal Opportunity Employer, including disability/veterans

About Walgreens Boots Alliance

Walgreens (www.walgreens.com) is included in the U.S. Retail Pharmacy and U.S. Healthcare segments of Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. (Nasdaq: WBA), an integrated healthcare, pharmacy and retail leader with a 170-year heritage of caring for communities. WBA’s purpose is to create more joyful lives through better health. Operating nearly 9,000 retail locations across America, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, Walgreens is proud to be a neighborhood health destination serving nearly 10 million customers each day. Walgreens pharmacists play a critical role in the U.S. healthcare system by providing a wide range of pharmacy and healthcare services, including those that drive equitable access to care for the nation’s medically underserved populations. To best meet the needs of customers and patients, Walgreens offers a true omnichannel experience, with fully integrated physical and digital platforms supported by the latest technology to deliver high-quality products and services in communities nationwide."
The actual salary an employee can expect to receive, plus bonus pursuant to the terms of any bonus plan if applicable, will depend on experience, seniority, geographic location, and other factors permitted by law. To review benefits, please visit jobs.walgreens.com/benefits.
"An Equal Opportunity Employer, including disability/veterans".
Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree and at least 2 years of experience in buying and/or merchandising functions such as assortment planning, space management, pricing, promotions, purchasing, or vendor negotiations OR experience in District leadership in the field OR High School Diploma/GED and at least 5 years of experience in buying and/or merchandising functions such as assortment planning, space management, pricing, promotions, purchasing, or vendor negotiations OR experience in District leadership in the field.
• Experience as Category Manager, Buyer, District Manager, or Community Leader.
• Knowledge of retail pricing, promotional planning/execution along with vendor negotiations.
• Knowledge of the local market and customer demographics.
• At least 1 year of experience in indirect management of team members, including assisting in the development, training and assignment of work/projects to other team members.
• Willing to travel up to 50% of the time for business purposes (within state and out of state).

Preferred Qualifications

• MBA/Master’s Degree
• Years of experience include a combination of buying, operations, and/or category management.
• CPG category management experience.
• Intermediate level skill in Microsoft Word (for example: inserting headers, page breaks, page numbers and tables and/or adjusting table columns).
• Intermediate level skill in Microsoft Excel (for example: using SUM function, setting borders, setting column width, inserting charts, using text wrap, sorting, setting headers and footers and/or print scaling).
• Intermediate level skill in Microsoft PowerPoint (for example: applying a theme, formatting character spacing, inserting a picture, changing slide layout and theme colors, adding transitions, customizing slide numbers, changing chart style and/or formatting font).

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