Category Manager
Requisition ID: 185903
Career Group: Corporate Office Careers
Job Category: Discount Category Management
Travel Requirements: 0 - 10%
Job Type: Full-Time
Country: Canada (CA)
Province: Ontario
City: Mississauga
Location: Tahoe Office
Embark on a rewarding career with Sobeys Inc., celebrated among Canada’s Top 100 employers, where your talents contribute to our commitment to excellence and community impact.
Our family of 128,000 employees and franchise affiliates share a collective passion for delivering exceptional shopping experiences and amazing food to all our customers. Our mission is to nurture the things that make life better – great experiences, families, communities, and our employees. We are a family nurturing families.
A proudly Canadian company, we started in a small town in Nova Scotia but we are now in communities of all sizes across this great country. With over 1,600 stores in all 10 provinces, you may know us as Sobeys, Safeway, IGA, Foodland, FreshCo, Thrifty Foods, Lawtons Drug Stores or another of our great banners but we are all one extended family.
Ready to Make an impact?
Sobeys is full of exciting opportunities, and we are always looking for passionate new talent to join our team! Our FreshCo. teammates are currently looking for a Category Manager to support our growing Multicultural category. If you love food from around the world, are excited to work in a National Category, and have the ability to coach teammates in executing with excellence this role is for you.
Here’s where you’ll be focusing:
Develop and implement category plans to deliver merchandising strategies and to achieve sales/profit targets for the overall region. Incorporate customer insight, market analysis, and store and market visits to identify category opportunities.
Lead, coach and manage direct reports including: selection, orientation/development, performance management/strategy alignment, succession planning and compensation.
Profitability
- Ensure banner profitability; develop and execute forecasts to attain all financial targets
- Review annually and manage CORE agreements
Product Life Cycle
- Manage effective product life cycle
- Manage inventory levels
- Monitor sell through performance/performance of promotional and seasonal programs
- Maximize category performance through the introduction of new and innovative products
Pricing
- Develop/manage category; item pricing subject to pricing philosophy loyalty program data
- Determine ad item selection/pricing based on banner financial criteria and event calendar
Promotions
- Develop and execute promotional plan; ensure all ads are correct/delivering category strategies; work with Merchandising to develop effective promotions
- Negotiate event participation and review HEAT ticket requests
- Determine retails, loyalty promotions, forecast volume and gross profits for all ad product
- Participate in the development and coordination of plan-o-grams and layout schematics based on store model (section sizes), plan-o-gram philosophy and the category plan
- Ensure product placement is based on consumer decision trees and trends in order to maximize profitable sales
Vendor Relations
- Manage all vendor interaction and negotiations to maximize customer and category insight; develop productive, proactive and consultative business relationships
- Optimize vendor investment to deliver on sales targets (marketing and trade spends)
Communication/ Employee Engagement
- Ensure effective communication within the department and with all other departments
What you have to offer:
- Ability to work independently, communicate effectively, work under pressure, and prioritize tasks effectively to meet deadlines
- Excellent organizational and prioritization skills with the ability to manage multiple projects with demonstrated flexibility and adaptability
- Demonstrated problem solving, decision making, and negotiating skills
- Excellent interpersonal skills and be a team player
- Excellent communication skills (both oral and written)
- Demonstrated strong success and experience influencing, motivating and coaching for results
- An Undergraduate Degree and a minimum of 8 years of relevant experience
- Merchandising or retail experience; grocery preferred
- Successful experience managing the category/department at Retail, as applicable, including managing product launches
- Proficient use of Microsoft Office Suite
At Sobeys we require our teammates to have the ability to adhere to a hybrid work model that requires your presence at one of our office locations at least three days per week. This requirement is integral to our commitment to team collaboration and the overall success of our office culture.
We offer a comprehensive Total Rewards package, which varies by role and designed to help our teammates to live better – physically, financially and emotionally.
Some websites share our job opportunities and may provide salary estimates without our knowledge. These estimates are based on similar jobs and postings for general comparison, but these numbers are not provided by our organization nor monitored for accuracy.
We will consider factors such as your working location, work experience and skills as well as internal equity, and market conditions to ensure the selected candidate is paid fairly and competitively. We look forward to discussing the specific compensation details relevant to this role with candidates who are selected to move forward in the recruitment process.
Our Total Rewards programs, for full-time teammates, goes well beyond your paycheque:
- Competitive Benefits Package, tailored to meet your needs, including health and dental coverage, life, short- and long-term disability insurance.
- Access to Virtual Health Care Platform and Employee and Family Assistance Program.
- A Retirement and Savings Plan that provides you with the opportunity to build and add value to your savings.
- A 10% in-store discount at our participating banners and access to a wide range of other discount programs, making your purchases more affordable.
- Learning and Development Resources to fuel your professional growth.
- Parental leave top-up
- Paid Vacation and Days-off
We are committed to accommodating applicants with disabilities throughout the hiring process and will work with applicants requesting accommodation at any stage of this process.