Himalaya Herbal Healthcare is seeking an experienced and highly driven Category Management Manager to lead the Category Management function and drive rapid growth on a young brand with significant new distribution in FDM retail and rapid growth in e-tail. In this role, you will bring your experience to bear and chart a course for the organization’s approach to Category Management. The proper candidate will have the breadth of experience and the confidence to work independently in high exposure situations with limited oversight along with a desire to be a key player in a growth environment.
The Category Management Manager will lead the development of actionable category insights for the vitamin/supplements and personal care categories and provide recommendations to turn insights into action. They will provide thought leadership to internal and external audiences delivered through story telling aimed at increasing acceptance of the brand across channels.
In this role, you will establish and champion the Category Management function in a fast growth, highly dynamic season and be a catalyst for the future direction of the business.
The successful candidate will possess the leadership and communication skills necessary to work in intense collaboration with cross functional teams to develop and execute plans to achieve revenue and profit goals. You will work in strong collaboration with the Sales, Shopper Marketing, Innovation and Brand Team to deliver on corporate objectives.
The Category Management Manager will report to Vice President of Sales and Marketing.
Duties and Responsibilities:
- Proactively act as a champion of Category Management and build organizational energy, understanding and enthusiasm behind the power and capabilities of the function.
- Turn insights into action by providing differentiated thought leadership delivered through simplified stories to gain acceptance and adoption
- Utilize a broad range of data metrics, tools, and analytics to identify opportunities and deliver insights to customers and internal stakeholders
- Prepare and present strategic insights to support selling initiatives and secure alignment of strategic and tactical plans at multiple levels of the organization. Support strategic dialogue via fact-based insights and actionable business analytics.
- Manage new item and annual review presentation development, identify opportunities to improve performance, gain acceptance and increase revenue.
- Develop the overall strategy for a product category and research new product options in the category to help drive sales and achieve targets
- Work closely with the sales and shopper team to determine optimal pricing through analysis of sales trends, competitors, buying habits and planograms of products to promote sales opportunities
- Recommends promotional solutions, researching competitors and working closely with retailers, brokers and sales/shopper teams to develop effective programs and pricing.
- Align planning process to meet retail planning needs with an eye towards critical milestones - line reviews, top to top meetings, etc.
- Be the subject matter expert and provide category perspective to Brand, Shopper and Innovation and Sales teams to enable broader understanding of decisions and recommendations and market dynamics.
- Establish an understanding of competitive activity and track performance and anticipate response requirements.
- Own the organization’s syndicated data reporting suite, maintain and distribute all category/business reviews, reports used for decision making.
- Works closely with VP and Sr. Director of Sales to provide input into developing the annual budget and expected revenue for category
- Plan and implement long-term development strategies for product categories
- Prepare retail projections for new items and expanding portfolios.
- Assortment recommendations, sku rankings and planogram development for retailer decks.
- Prepare post promotion analysis and recommendations for improvement.
- Conducting competitive and category reviews.
- Identify white space opportunities and provide ongoing recommendations.
- Deep dives as needed into segments, trends and/or competitors.
- Maintain a high level of analytical skill, attention to detail, and the ability to juggle multiple responsibilities and projects at once while meeting deadlines.
Competencies
- CPG Category Management experience is required.
- FDM experience is required.
- Proven ability to translate data into selling stories for internal and external audiences.
- Experience working with a sales team and an understanding of the inter-dynamics of the sales and marketing functions specifically in a CPG and FDM environment.
- Demonstrated ability to present to customers and history of customer contact in a sales setting.
- Experience defending plans and making the case for resources with data.
- Ability to maintain excellence and be highly effective working with a remote team and having only periodic in-person contact with leadership.
- Ability to work with ambiguity, navigate and add value to business situations and organizational challenges with no existing process or solution.
- Ability to manage projects, develop timelines, articulate critical paths and deliver outcomes on time.
- Demonstrated excellence in written and verbal communication.
- Demonstrated customer-centric mindset.
- A bias for action and the ability to chart a course vs. follow one.
Required Qualifications:
- Bachelor’s degree required, with MBA or Master’s degree in Marketing a plus.
- Experience working with a CPG sales team, calling on FDM retailers.
- A progression of category management or sales experience in a CPG setting including a Category Management position on a key brand or portfolio within a CPG company.
- Extensive experience using syndicated data sources (e.g. Nielsen, IRI) and digital analytics (e.g. Stackline, Google Analytics, Shopify).
- Experience preparing customer presentations and presenting to customers.
- Prior experience in personal care and/or health and wellness categories a plus
- Prior experience building channel strategies.
- Significant analytical and critical thinking skills with experience analyzing data & translating it into action.
- Demonstrated success in challenging and ambiguous business situations.
- Consistent record of posting strong results in a Category Management role.
- Highly collaborative and capable of receiving direction from peers and leaders across functions.
- Willingness to travel regularly to headquarters in Sugarland, TX, attend trade shows and support customer meetings.
- Computer skills including MS Office programs such as Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint.
- Expert level Excel and above average power point skills are required to be effective in this role.
- Excellent organizational skills and the ability to discern priorities without supervision.
- Strong attention to detail balanced with a sense of urgency and a commitment to excellence.
- Demonstrated excellent written and communication skills.
- Examples of prior category management work and customer presentations will be requested, along with references.
- Experience executing the Category Management function in the e-tail space a significant plus.
Preferred Qualifications:
- Knowledge of and personal involvement with natural products and a healthy lifestyle.
- CPG sales experience a plus.
Compensation and Benefits:
- Competitive base salary and bonus, commensurate with experience
- Company benefits including medical, dental, vision, life, disability & 401(k)
Experience:
- Minimum 7 years’ experience with at least 4 in a category management function.
This position description is not designed to cover or contain a comprehensive listing of activities, duties or responsibilities that are required of the role. Other duties, responsibilities and activities may change or be assigned at any time with or without notice.