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About the Role
As Merchandising Lead, you will own merchandise planning for Sanderson Design Group, maximizing profitability, availability, and return on investment across all brands, regions, and channels. This foundational role involves building forecasting models, establishing trading cycles, and serving as the primary contact for Finance, Operations, and Digital on sales, stock, and margin. You will shape how the company plans and trades, collaborating closely with Purchasing and Product Strategy.
Responsibilities
- Own the weekly merchandise plan (WSSI) for sales, stock, and intake, reconciled to business numbers.
- Plan sales and flow through to cost of sales, intake, and stock cover, owning the weekly reforecast cycle.
- Produce and present the weekly and monthly trading position with clear recommendations.
- Provide volume plans for the warehouse and support internal factories with volume forecasts.
- Own open-to-buy and intake phasing, ensuring stock lands in line with demand and working capital is used effectively.
- Set, monitor, and drive product availability targets, agreeing corrective action with Purchasing and Supply Chain.
- Manage terminal and slow-moving stock, planning clearance and exit routes.
- Work with Purchasing to set replenishment parameters, minimum order quantities, and lead-time assumptions.
- Grow sales per SKU while maintaining range discipline and keeping new products within the agreed plan.
- Forecast sales at collection, design, and SKU level, setting initial buy quantities, colourway depth, and phasing for new collections.
- Own the New Collection ROI process end-to-end, tracking performance and recommending decisions.
- Support the seasonal budget process and review targets for sales, SKU count, product mix, intake margin, and stock.
- Provide analysis behind pricing architecture, discount structure, and margin improvement.
- Build and own the merchandising reporting toolset, including Qlik Sense apps, dashboards, and automated reporting.
- Keep product and planning data accurate across business systems and drive improvement at source.
- Implement and explore new systems and processes, championing merchandising as a new discipline.
- Track performance regularly, spotting bottlenecks, diagnosing root causes, and proposing improvements.
- Build strong relationships with Design, Marketing, Sales, Finance, Supply Chain, Customer Services, and Digital Trading.
- Support the Digital Trading team with product insight and performance for D2C websites.
- Deputize for the Head of Merchandising & Product Strategy as required.
- Uphold the Group’s health and safety standards.
Requirements
- Proven merchandising experience at senior merchandiser or lead level, gained in retail, wholesale, or a branded product business.
- Demonstrable ownership of a WSSI, open-to-buy, and forecasting process.
- Confidence to plan sales, stock, and intake.
- Advanced working knowledge of MS Excel, including complex formulas and large data sets.
- Working knowledge of a BI tool (Qlik Sense preferred).
- SQL or similar data skills are desirable.
- Genuine appetite to develop reporting and automation.
- Strong commercial judgement – able to turn analysis into a recommendation and defend it confidently.
- Strong numerical, analytical, and interpretive skills.
- Logical, structured approach to problem-solving.
- Strong organisational skills.
- Ability to think strategically while managing a weekly trading rhythm.
- Excellent written and spoken communication.
- Credibility to influence senior stakeholders.
- Confident building relationships across Design, Marketing, Sales, Purchasing, Customer Services, and Finance.
- Comfortable establishing a new function – setting the process and ways of working where none currently exist.
- A genuine feel for the product.
- Understanding of Sanderson Design Group and its end consumers.
Skills
- Merchandising
- WSSI
- Open-to-buy
- Forecasting
- Sales planning
- Stock planning
- Intake planning
- MS Excel
- BI tools
- Qlik Sense
- SQL
- Data analysis
- Reporting
- Automation
- Commercial judgement
- Numerical skills
- Analytical skills
- Interpretive skills
- Problem-solving
- Organisational skills
- Strategic thinking
- Communication skills
- Relationship building
- Stakeholder management
Location
- Chiswick
Work Type
- Travel is required
Experience Level
- Senior merchandiser or lead level
Education Level
- Degree-level educated, or equivalent experience gained on the job
About the Company
- Sanderson Design Group plc is a luxury interior design house with six iconic brands and over 165 years of history.
- Brands include Sanderson, Morris & Co., Harlequin, Zoffany, Clarke & Clarke, and Scion.
- Portfolio spans fabric, wallpaper, and paint, with manufacturing capabilities.
- Purpose is to ‘bring the beautiful into people’s homes and lives’.
- Owner of one of Europe’s largest design archives with over 75,000 historical documents and artworks.
- Has a growing international licensing programme supporting strategic global expansion.
Equal Opportunity
- We are committed to providing equal opportunities to all and we welcome applications from candidates with diverse backgrounds.