Head of Buying/Merchandising & Business Development
Twinning
Total des années d'expérience :16 years, 1 Mois
An extremely exciting opportunity of building & launching a new E-commerce startup in Dubai.
The responsibility of starting from a clean slate, growing the platform from none to 32 brands, shipping to all countries in the GCC and heading the Buying & Business Development functions was an extremely exciting prospect.
Key Achievements
• Acquired and launched vital licensed Brands for the kids category which boosted KSA performance (our key Kids & Baby market) to 65% of total GMV for Twinning
• Helped expand catalogue by 16x from 790 SKUs to 13, 000+ SKUs
• Helped deliver exponential growth— grew GMV by 607% and orders by 510% during Jul-Aug 2019
A combined business size of 7 countries (CIS + MENA), topline AED 210 M with 100, 000 SKUs and 8 direct reports
• Ownership of P&L and annual budgets (including OTB, Pricing, Margin, Sell Through & Markdown management)
• Liaison with international Brand partners - including annual & quarterly business reviews - through frequent video conferences & visits to US offices
• Oversaw Marketing & VM to ensure right and consistent product focus across all stores and countries
Key Achievements
• Increased sell through by 55% YoY with a tighter buy and effective price bucketing
• Formulated & implemented a systematic strategy to reduce stock cover by 38% within 2 seasons through bundle offers and bulk sales through multiple outlet channels
• Helped increase YoY net profit by 10% through effective operational strategy, pricing & margin management
Led 4 direct reports to launch new Brands for the GCC market with a combined annual business of AED 150 M (brick & mortar + Ecommerce) - framework involved customer research, competitor mapping, brand positioning, price point planning and commercial viability analysis
• Directed and managed all aspects of product - buying, planning, merchandising, pricing, margin management and liquidation
• Oversaw Marketing, Supply Chain and Operations to ensure smooth running of the Brands
Key Achievements
• Developed annual plan outlining resource planning and successfully recruited the retail teams for the flagship stores of Charming Charlie
• Built the seasonal “Pricing and Promotion” model to drive initiatives to increase gross margin and sell through
Owned the product strategy (including pricing & gross margin) for the Diesel joint venture in the country - 12 stores and all E-commerce channels
• Streamlined & conducted the product training process for store teams & new employees
Key Achievements
• Achieved the highest Full Price sell through in SS14 (64%) in the history of the brand through effective pricing, increasing product width by 20% and reducing depth of buy
• Helped increase new customer acquisition by 35% through effective price bucketing strategy to attract aspirational customers
Worked on wholesale business of brands such as Karl Lagerfeld, Patrizia Pepe, Marithe Francois Girbaud, Kenzo etc. through seasonal buyer appointments, sales meetings, product pricing & involvement in the general workings of a fashion distribution agency. Represented some of the brands at Capsule 2010, Paris (an international trade show)
Designed several collections every season, taking into account market demographics, price points and budget; Planned the pricing of the collections for increased margins
Managed the liaison between the Technical Design, Fabric Sourcing, Quality Assurance & Apparel Design departments and the New York Head Office
MA in Design Management for the Fashion Industries
B.Des in Knitwear Design