Associate - Category Manager - Beauty - Tryano & SAKS

INSPIRE | EXHILARATE | DELIGHT

For over six decades, Chalhoub Group has been a partner and creator of luxury experiences in the Middle East. The Group, in its endeavour to excel as a hybrid retailer, has reinforced its distribution and marketing services with a portfolio of eight owned brands and over 300 international brands in the luxury, beauty, fashion, and art de vivre categories. More recently, the Group expanded its expertise into new categories of luxury watches, jewellery, and eyewear.

Every step at Chalhoub Group is taken with the customer at heart. Be it constantly reinventing itself or focusing on innovation to provide luxury experiences at over 750+ experiential retail stores, online and through mobile apps, each touch point leads to delighting the customer.

Today, Chalhoub Group stands for 14,000 skilled and talented professionals across seven countries, whose cohesive efforts have resulted in the Group being ranked third in the Middle East and first in Saudi Arabia as a Great Place to Work.

To keep the innovation journey going, the Group has set up "The Greenhouse", which is not just an innovation hub, but also an incubator space and accelerator for start-ups and small businesses in the region and internationally. This is just one of the several initiatives taken by the Group to reinvent itself, catalysed by forward thinking and future-proofing. The Group has also been embedding sustainability at the core of its business strategy with a clear commitment towards people, partners and the planet, and by being a member of the United Nations Global Compact Community and signatory of the Women's Empowerment Principles.

What you'll be doing

Our Associate Category Manager based in our Dubai offices will oversee Tryano in Abu Dhabi and SAKS Bahrain. The Associate Category Manager is responsible for maximizing the profit potential and supporting management's business decision-making by consolidating and analysing sell-out, gross margin, and stock data.

Additionally, the Associate Category Manager is responsible for gathering, analyzing, and organizing data to ensure its integrity. This role involves producing month-to-date and year-to-date trend reports on sales, brand rankings, and market share, as well as in-depth reports on individual store performance. The focus is on tracking category growth, identifying best-sellers, achieving budget targets, analyzing basket details, and assessing overall productivity.

Responsibilities

1. Assist the Senior Category Manager in developing the category business plan in alignment with the strategic objectives of Tryano & Saks.
2. Formulate and continuously monitor progress on category objectives, including sales, gross margins, and market share.
3. Track and assess the achievement of targets versus plans.
4. Attend brand strategy meetings to align on new product launches and ensure timely ordering and availability of new products according to the launch calendar.
5. Participate in meetings with new suppliers to assess potential and assist in selecting new brands in line with category and market strategy.
6. Create and follow up on new vendor contracts.
7. Coordinate with the supply chain team to track new item creation and order placements.
8. Assist in analyzing new launch quantities based on performance and trends.
9. Ensure brand assortments are updated by conducting quarterly reviews.
10. Review brand price changes to ensure agreed-upon margins are met and that prices are competitive in the market.
11. Assist in planning and executing the annual promotional calendar for brands, including animations, mall podiums, new launches, and key promotional periods.
12. Prepare monthly reports covering brand performance, ranking, inventory, fill rates, promotional activity outcomes, and BA productivity.
13. Collaborate with the finance team to manage invoices for rebates, mall podiums, staff incentives and salaries, and promotional funding.
14. Work closely with the marketing team on various tasks related to launching and promoting new and existing brands.
15. Partner with the retail and VM teams to address merchandising requirements, including executing planograms, requesting POSM, managing brand location changes, and adding new brands.

What you'll need to succeed

- 2-3 years' experience in buying or category/brand management, handling data and reporting, preferably within beauty
- Cross-functional collaboration mindset, with experience managing external partnerships and internal stakeholders.
- Strong analytical and organizational skills.

What we can offer you

With us, you will turn your aspirations into reality. We will help shape your journey through enriching experiences, learning and development opportunities and exposure to different assignments within your role or through internal mobility. Our Group offers diverse career paths for those who are extraordinary, every day.

We recognise the value that you bring, and we strive to provide a competitive benefits package which includes health care, child education contribution, remote and flexible working policies as well as exclusive employee discounts.

We Invite All Applicants to Apply

It Takes Diversity Of Thought, Culture, Background, Differing Abilities and Perspectives to truly Inspire, Exhilarate and Delight our customers. At Chalhoub Group, we are committed to inclusion and diversity.

We welcome all applicants to apply and be part of our exciting future. We ensure equal opportunity for all our applicants without regard to gender, age, race, religion, national origin or disability status.

Department: RETAIL & DISTRIBUTION
Role: Associate Buyer