Trade Planning Manager in Chester House, Epsom Ave, Handforth, Cheadle, Greater Manchester, SK9 3DF

Pets at Home Group Plc is the UK’s leading pet care business; our commitment is to make sure pets and their owners get the very best advice, products and care. We have over 450 stores, over 310 Groom Rooms and 440 First Opinion Vet Practices. Our business is fast-paced, innovative and fun and it's our people that make the real difference. This is a fantastic opportunity to come and work for an award winning company who put people at the very heart of everything they do.

About the role

As Trade Planning Manager, you will be responsible for creating and managing our annual trade plan. You will prioritise range activity, promotional intent and seasonal events to deliver against our business sales plan targets. To achieve this, you will use data, insight and consumer sentiment to influence and support multiple functions across the business to lockdown and agree a robust trade plan.

A key focus in this role will be translating our consumer plan to ensure all commercial activity accurately reflects the external market and consumer expectation at all points throughout the year, delivering value and excitement that leads to sales conversion. Another major responsibility is to support the promotional planning process, ensuring our promotional phases are planned timely and to a clear set of principles that deliver the best consumer value possible.

In this role you will work with our Trading, Marketing, Merchandising & Supply teams to ensure the trade plan can be successfully delivered across all channels within the business. There is also a requirement to work alongside our supplier base and ensure collaborative working is in place to deliver joined-up plans that target the right level of step change.

About you

You’ll be commercially focussed with a breadth of skill and experience from across retail.

Key to success in the role will be the ability to put yourself in the customer’s shoes and ask “does this make sense”, and then coordinate, influence and challenge appropriately. You’ll have strong interpersonal and communication skills that allow you to engage stakeholders, manage expectations and drive results.

Previous experience of working in a buying and/or category management role would be beneficial.

Further key experience/attributes includes;

• Strong commercial acumen and experience of delivering financial targets
• Experience of collating data and insight to translate into clear outputs
• Demonstrable success of planning and managing cross-functional projects
• The ability to influence change when working with senior leaders
• The ability to work in complex and ambiguous situations. You’ll be able to evidence your ability to adapt planning to changing external factors
• Results driven, with an ability to plan and organise self and others in order to achieve objectives and targets
• The ability to engage at all levels across the organisation
• The ability to clearly articulate strategies, visions and desired outcomes
• Experience of managing complex workloads and milestone planning

Our diversity and inclusion vision is that everyone is welcome and feels part of our group. If you think you’re a good match to what we are looking for, and you share our belief that together ‘we’re better with pets’, we’d like to hear from you, whatever your background or circumstances.

About our purpose

Far more than a retailer, Pets at Home Group is the UK’s leading pet care specialist, fulfilling every possible pet and owner need, from food and accessories to grooming and vet services. Since 1991, we’ve been building a business around pets and their owners and we’ve set our sights on becoming the best pet care business in the world. Join us now and you can be part of that journey, developing your future as we develop ours. This is a place where you can take pride and passion in your work within an inspiring, professional team that’s focused on supporting pets and their owners to live happier lives together.

We’re driven by the wellbeing of pets and we make sure we look after our people too. We depend on your commitment and innovation, and reward it with competitive pay and comprehensive benefits. Together we’ll create the future of pet care.