Merchandising Manager: Job Profile and Role

Have you ever wondered who is responsible for Harrod’s or Henley’s Christmas window displays? And are those displays two of your absolute favourites when visiting or living in the UK? Well, we can certainly agree with your fascination. And we can also tell you who is behind those gorgeous Christmas merchandise tales: a merchandising manager. Naturally, he or she does not only do seasonal displays. In fact, lots of other responsibilities take place behind the scenes.

The following blog will tell you all there is to know about the job of a merchandising manager. We will take a look at your potential employers and what salaries they pay as well as at the qualifications and skills needed. We will also give you a glimpse into the working day of a merchandising manager. To conclude this blog, we will give you three important tips to thrive as a merchandising manager.

Short Summary

• As a merchandising manager, you are responsible for planning and executing strategies that optimise the sale of your company’s merchandise – be it in retail or e-commerce.
• As a merchandising manager, you are in charge of analysing data, market trends, sales and your competition.
• As a merchandising manager, you are responsible for the visual display of your company’s merchandise – both in retail and online. This way, you ensure your customer’s willingness to buy from you and not the competition.

Job description

As a merchandising manager, you are in charge of securing and selling your company’s merchandise. This involves dealing with vendors and suppliers, your colleagues and superiors and your customer base. As a merchandising manager, you come up with innovative sales strategies as well as exciting visual merchandising strategies. You are also responsible for product selection and assortment planning, deciding which products sell the best, which products have expired their shelf lives and which products need stocking for seasonal occasions.

Responsibilities

• Merchandise Selection/Procurement
• Compliance/Quality Assurance
• Vendor/Supplier Relations
• Sales Analysis/Reporting
• Inventory Management
• Visual Merchandising
• Budget Management
• Price Management
• Seasonal Planning
• Market Research

Different types of Merchandising Manager

• Inventory Manager
• Private Label Manager
• Visual Display Manager
• International Merchandising Manager
• E-Commerce Merchandising Manager

Salary

If you are thinking about becoming a merchandising manager in the UK, your annual salary will typically range from £43,000 to £58,300. These numbers refer to a full-time merchandising manager and can also be considerably higher. Note that entry-level merchandising managers will earn less. Their annual salaries usually come in at around £28,000.

Your salary is not only influenced by your position and work experience. Location, employer and company size can be further factors that have an impact on your annual salary.

Working hours

Typically, a merchandising manager works about 40 hours a week. Usually, these hours fit into normal business hours from 9 to 5 from Mondays to Fridays. However, it is also not unusual for merchandising managers to work in the evenings and on the weekends. This can be a regular occurrence during the festive season, product launches or promotions.

Note that a merchandising manager’s working hours can also be affected by overtime. We recommend that you specify the exact number of overtime hours you are prepared to work in advance with your future employer. It is also sensible to specify if this overtime is paid or unpaid.

Employers

Merchandising managers can find work in pretty much every sector dealing with sales. Therefore, your future job might be with a fashion retail company, a beauty company, an e-commerce company or a big grocery company. Depending on your expertise and your personal preferences, you may also be brave enough to apply with one of the big names in your chosen industry. Who knows? You may have an exciting career ahead of you at a luxury fashion house or a luxury department store.

Qualifications

The required qualifications for becoming a merchandising manager can be either an academic degree or having completed an advanced apprenticeship in an appropriate field. Besides the educational background, you can improve your skills and job chances by completing a set of certificates. These can include the following: a CIPS (Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply) certificate in supply chain management and procurement or retail industry certifications.

Featured Achievements in a Merchandising Manager’s CV

Your future employer has certain achievements he or she would like to find in your merchandising manager’s CV. Among those are how you have managed to increase sales figures, which products you have launched successfully, and how you have built and maintained important relationships to vendors, suppliers, and customers.

Skills

Having or getting the necessary hard skills for the job as a merchandising manager is only one part of excelling in this job. Your qualifications should also always be accompanied by a matching set of soft skills. Let’s have a look at some of the most important soft skills you should either have or develop when planning on becoming a merchandising manager.

Creativity

As a merchandising manager, one of your responsibilities is to come up with exciting and eye-catching window displays. Having a creative mindset and a creative eye is therefore a valuable skill to have when you want to be an excellent merchandising manager. Naturally, your creativity should not be limited to window displays, but to every other aspect of your job that requires creative input.

Teamwork

As a merchandising manager, you will not work alone. In fact, you will be working with both a team and other departments and clients. Being a team player is essential to perform well in your profession. Therefore, teamwork should not be a foreign concept to you – and neither should the accompanying interpersonal and communication skills.

Leadership

Let’s say you have been promoted to senior merchandising manager. This position goes hand in hand with being in charge of a team. Thus, leadership skills should be a basic skill to begin with – and a skill that you should develop and master the longer you have worked as a merchandising manager.

Career Path

Starting at entry level, you will gain your first work experience as a merchandising manager. Your first role will quite likely be that of an assistant merchandising manager. With a few years of job experience, you can climb up the career ladder and become first a merchandising manager and then a senior merchandising manager. Depending on your company’s promotion policy, you may well one day be head of said company.

Educational Background

An academic degree in a merchandising-related field will give you the most advantageous educational background as a future merchandising manager. Most companies prefer candidates who have completed their Bachelor’s degree or even a Master’s degree in business, merchandising or fashion/design.

Alternatively, you may want to consider doing an appropriate advanced apprenticeship. Usually, this also gives you an advantage: your first work experience as a future merchandising manager.

Entry Level

After finishing your education, you will start your merchandising manager’s career at entry level. Typically, your first job will be that of an assistant merchandising manager. Gaining experience in your profession will contribute to you climbing the career ladder and might involve promotions to merchandising manager and, later, senior merchandising manager.

Continuous Learning

Gaining valuable experience in your job is one way to achieve your set career goals. It should always be accompanied by the willingness to continuously learn. This can range from reading the latest news and blogs to taking part in (online) workshops, seminars and webinars. Networking can also help you to continuously learn. By getting to know your contacts’ ways of doing their jobs, you can get valuable tips on how to improve yourself (and what to avoid when wanting to be an excellent merchandising manager).

A Day in the Life of a Merchandising Manager

Obviously, anything merchandise-related is what a day in the life of a merchandising manager revolves around. And obviously, this involves checking your inbox and prioritising the day’s jobs. In this section, we will explore what a typical day in the life of a merchandising manager can look like.

Data Analysis

Analysing the relevant data, such as sales figures, market trends and inventories is an important part of a merchandising manager’s day. These data give you insights into areas that are running smoothly and areas that need readjusting. In order to read these data correctly and efficiently, you usually use relevant software and apps.

Product Selection/Assortment Planning

As a merchandising manager, you are in charge of your company’s merchandise and important decisions connected to the merchandise. What products are your bestsellers? Which products should feature in your latest campaigns and promotions? Which products are proper shelf-huggers and should not be featured in the foreseeable future? The answers to these and further questions help you to evaluate your product selection and assortment planning.

Visual Merchandising

Having merchandise is all well and good. But it will never sell if your customers do not know what it looks like. This is where visual merchandising comes in – be it in real life or online shop displays. It is your job as a merchandising manager to display merchandise to its highest advantage. This way, you ensure that your customers will stop to take a closer look – and ideally, your visual merchandising will animate them to buy.

Tips for Thriving as a Merchandising Manager

You continuously learn and try to improve as a merchandising manager? Then you have already applied two of the most important steps in thriving in this profession. But we can go the extra mile for you and with you – by giving you another three important tips for thriving as a merchandising manager:

• Pricing strategy
• Vendor relationships
• Merchandise planning

Pricing Strategy

Having the perfect pricing strategy is one of the tips for thriving as a merchandising manager. This way, you will have an overview of all the relevant costs, competitive pricing and expected revenues. The pricing strategy therefore enables you to stay within planned budgets. And it ensures that your company avoids financial losses due to unstrategic planning.

Vendor Relationships

As a merchandising manager, you deal with vendors on a regular basis. After all, they are the people who supply your company with the goods and wares that you are planning to display and sell. Having excellent relationships with said vendors is important when you want to thrive as a merchandising manager. These relationships can involve negotiating the best prices and securing the best products.

Merchandise Planning

Your company’s merchandise is what keeps that company afloat and ahead of the competition. It is also what ideally makes your customers happy. One of your responsibilities as a merchandising manager is to make sure that your best products are always well-stocked. It is also your responsibility to ensure that seasonal products are ordered well in advance – naturally, also in sufficient numbers. If you are excellent at merchandise planning, you will thrive as a merchandising manager.

Frequently Asked Questions