Merchandise Space Planner

In your role as Merchandise Space Planner at The North West Company, you will be responsible for creating and updating planograms to deliver improved assortment productivity that aligns with merchandising strategy intent and enhances the customer shopping experience. As part of the refresh and review process, you will build planograms to align with the defined assortments for the category/cluster and the defined visual guidelines and standards. You will partner with the Merchandise Planning Manager, Merchandising Category Teams, and Data Management, to develop/maintain visual standards, guidelines, and policies that serve as a key input to the development of the planograms. You will work on leveraging space planning and analytic tools to ensure that product placement in planograms maximizes sales and inventory performance for the assigned categories.

Joining NWC gives you the opportunity for growth and development throughout the company, a competitive salary and benefits package, and to be part of a dynamic and diverse culture.

NWC is a leading retailer to under-served rural communities and urban neighborhood markets in the following regions: Northern Canada, Western Canada, rural Alaska, the South Pacific islands, and the Caribbean. Our stores offer a broad range of products and services with an emphasis on food. Our value offer is to be the best local shopping choice for everyday household and local lifestyle needs. Check out northwest.ca for more information.

Your Role

• Design and build planograms; incorporating merchandising strategy, merchandising standards and best practices.
• Responsible for maintaining the data integrity in the database used to create planograms for assigned categories.
• Responsible for analyzing planogram builds in search of time savings, reducing errors and increasing the sales performance of assigned Category planograms.
• Leverage space management tools to analyze and develop recommendations around key merchandising factors (e.g., space productivity, inventory turns, product trending).
• Attend regular meetings with cross-functional teams to participate in business discussions and provide space planning expertise, contributing to strategic merchandising plans for the business.
• Set up Planograms for reviews at NWC Training Center.
• Ensures that key deliverables associated with the creation, edit, review, and approval of planograms (Planogram Calendar) are met in a timely and accurate manner.
• Prepare Planograms for Share Point / H.O. files and distribute to stores on a regular established schedule/deadline.
• Planogram maintenance using Space Management tool to remove and include new items into current and WIP (work in progress) planograms.
• Maintain the planogram library, including naming conventions within designated categories.
• Create and distribute planogram books in a timely manner to support reprofiling (new and renovated) projects for stores.
• Provide ongoing support to all stores regarding implementation of planograms.

Desired Skills & Experience

• Post-secondary education in a related field or combination of education and experience.
• Preferred 3-5 years of retail experience
• Demonstrated proficiency in MS Office applications with advanced skills in Excel and Access.
• Experience with Nielsen Spaceman Shelf Management Software an asset.
• Demonstrated ability to work within strict timelines while managing multiple projects/tasks.
• Must have proven organizational, planning and prioritizing skills.
• Must be detail oriented while maintaining a high degree of accuracy.
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills with a demonstrated ability to interact with all levels of internal and external customers

Location: Gibraltar House, 77 Main Street, Winnipeg, Manitoba

Reports to: Merchandise Planning Manager

We create a collaborative and constructive culture by:

• Being Enterprising • Committing to our Customer • Working with Passion • Leading and Developing Others • Demonstrating Respect and Inclusivity • Building Trust

The North West Company is committed to inclusion and diversity and encourages applications from all candidates including but not limited to: all religions and ethnicities, LGBTQ2s+, BIPOC, and persons with disabilities.

A competitive salary is being offered along with opportunities to learn, develop and advance throughout the organization. We thank all applicants for their interest; however only those selected for an interview will be contacted.

This position adheres to the Corporate Application Process Guidelines