Category & Shopper Manager – FMCG (Retail)

SUMMARY:
Category & Shopper Manager – FMCG (Retail)

POSITION INFO:

Cape Town

Premium FMCG brand is hiring

Position Purpose

The vision for the Category & Shopper Marketing Team is to be a trusted team of Shopper & Category experts in confectionery that is central to providing strategic and short-term solutions to deliver Category growth, internally and externally. The Category team is living a category growth mindset, to grow faster and more sustainably than the category through superior understanding and fulfilment of consumer and shopper needs.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead shopper insight and category insights, leading key initiatives from project development, management to completion
• Leadership for Category Vision and Drivers that enables customer teams to persuade key retail partners of the category strategy
• Create and deliver short and long term shopper insight initiatives, as prioritized by the management team, to support MPD planning & specific segment challenges to turn shoppers into buyers of our brands
• Leadership of brand / account workshops to enable the Marketing, Shopper Marketing & Sales teams to develop and sell the annual seasonal plans to our key retail partners
• Lead the key cross functional Shopper Marketing projects
• Coordination of both qualitative and quantitative consumer & shopper marketing research to lead new insights into the development of the category
• Lead ongoing development of Category Vision, Drivers & Tactics, to engage our retail partners on the growth opportunities for the confectionery category
• Through insight, lead and support customer marketing with new activation initiatives for brands to increase their visibility in store

• Lead for Shopper Marketing contribution to the annual brand planning process
• Support marketing team with shopper marketing insight/strategies that support new brand initiatives for existing and new products
• Ensure that the identified shopper strategies play a core role in the company, category and brand long term plans
• Support customer marketing team with category insight to lead new activation in store, both on and off the fixture.
• .

• Planning and Review:
• Provide support to the internal Brand and Key Account teams by conducting regular business analyses (with the focus on key strategic drivers and opportunities), presentations and merchandising solutions
• Proactive management of team priorities
• Build and develop internal reporting databases and templates
• Manage cross-functional targets
• Identify key trade opportunities including maximizing in-trade opportunities (ranging, distribution, merchandising and visibility)
• Oversee development of Category Selling stories
• Delivering commentaries and sales analysis for monthly business review reports, pro-actively identifying business opportunities and issues

• Merchandising Input
• Manage planograms & merchandising guidelines to support category shelving initiatives including the training thereof internally and externally
• Responsible for updating space management product / image library & IRi data characteristics

• Team Leadership
• Training members of the cross functional team on data systems (Retailer POS, IRi)
• Build effective working relationships and processes with the Sales and Marketing teams with the aim of driving incremental category and brand growth
• Lead cross functional ways of working ultimately ensuring alignment to and focus on business objectives

Skills and Knowledge

• Proven Category Management Expertise
• Advanced MS Excel, IRi Temple & Space Planning Skills
• Understanding shopper/consumer/market insights and how these drive category growth in retailers
• Understanding of competitor and market dynamics
• Excellent numeracy, analytical and data interpretation skills
• Understanding brand and key account strategies and interpreting these into customized category plans
• Implementing and evaluating category plans in-store
• Excellent interpersonal skills, able to build relationships and influence at all levels – internal and external
• Confident, assertive self-starter with a drive for results and highly motivated
• High level of initiative, able to drive projects independently
• Structured with organizational skills
• Ability to work under pressure and meet tight deadlines

Requirements:

• BComm Degree or suitable tertiary qualification
• Previous experience in a customer-facing Category Management role, FMCG environment (minimum 5 years)
• Prerequisites include advanced skills & working knowledge of external market data software and space planning software
• Knowledge of and advanced skills in Microsoft Office (specifically Excel and PowerPoint)

As per our client’s operational requirements, a clear credit and criminal history will apply

Please email cv and package requirements to