Adidas CATEGORY MANAGER SPORTSWEAR 

Pakistan, Punjab, Lahore 

350126422

Purpose & Overall Relevance for the Organization:

) with focus on key countries Poland and Czech Republic. Support the GTM Director with the execution of a robust category GTM plan, within the strategic framework set by the Global & European BU’s & following the EU PRIORITIES & Cluster Central Europe execution plan.

GTM:

• Delivers a complete GTM proposition & local category marketing plan (GTM plan) in line with strategic objectives for dedicated product division
• GTM plan contains product, distribution, communication & activation tools, sports marketing, omnichannel
• Product Division expert within the Category
• Represent the brand and BU internally and externally.
• Support the European BU on local ranging, forecasting, and pricing topics (data, mark-up, segmentation, allocation).
• Provide input into SMU for local key accounts.
• Get an early preview of the new season: Collaborate with stakeholders to review product concepts, provide feedback on market alignment, and ensure the product assortment meets demand.
• Work with stakeholders to create activation plans for product launches, determining retailer selection and marketing budget allocation.
• Ensure effective Go-To-Market execution, managing the product journey from HQ creation to retail landing, including retailer selection, activations, and visibility.
• Own the process from product creation (with no direct impact) to its retail landing and activations

Collaboration & Process:

• Key contact person for Sales as well as cross functional marketing teams
• Develop category plans and drive handover to Sales during Sales & Marketing meetings (SMM)
• Together with Sports Marketing, create and present specific promo ranges and product offers in alignment with Europe BU
• Ensures an efficient execution of the given sample order process & on target/budget
• Engage with a x-functional group of category experts from different marketing & sales teams (“category/master-groups”) to drive the review and steering of the Cluster GTM plan and process for the Category
• Serve as the voice of CZ & Poland towards Europe, ensuring that the needs of local markets are communicated effectively to European counterparts.
• Serve as the voice of Europe within local markets, translating European strategies into actionable local plans.

Commercial & Analytics:

• Demonstrate a “full marketplace” attitude (ALL countries & channels: DTC, WHS, X-border accounts) and stays in close exchange with the relevant AKA teams
• Drives the successful sell-in process (from Category input, over pre-lines to sell-in meetings of identified strategic accounts)
• Develops relevant distribution and segmentation strategies to successfully manage key franchises in the Cluster (MRA tiering, Allocation)
• Uses available market data to build dedicated product division plans (e.g. NPD data)
• Maintain regular analytics on the sell-in and sell-through performance of respective category (analytical support from Finance team)
• Give input to European BU’s on country price-grouping and submit requests exception throughout the pricing process
• Provide feedback on product offerings and suggest necessary adjustments to align with local market needs, particularly for seasonal products (FW/SS).

Key Relationships:

• Brand activation & Sports Marketing teams
• Sales, AKA & DTC
• European BU
• Cluster MOPS
• Business & Sales Development
• Finance teams
• DTC & Cross-boarder accounts

KPIs:

• Net Sales
• Net Margin
• Go In Margin
• Sell out
• Market share development
• Share of search

Knowledge, skills and abilities:

• Consumer focus with deep product and range knowledge (app, ftw, acc) with a strong understanding of seasonality (FW/SS).
• Excellent understandingof the balanced relationship between brand and commercial aspects to develop distribution-channel-specific GTM solutions
• Strong understanding of sports and or lifestyle industry, or at least familiarity with the sports market and its trends.
• Strong organizationaland convincing presentation skills
• Passionate about sports & fashion
• Pro- active (engaging & impact-oriented) mindset, ability to think end-to-end
• Ability to work in a fast-paced environment with different international cultures
• Business mindset: Very good numerical and analytical skills, experience in finance
• Good experience tomanage projects on cross-functional level
• Manager with advanced cross functional marketing knowledge and market experience in sport and/or fashion/lifestyle categories
• Passionate about sports & fashion

Requisite Education and Experience/Minimum Qualifications

• University degree in business administration, ideally with marketing and sales focus or equivalent professional experience
• 4+ years’ experience in merchandising, cross-functional marketing and/or sales
• Fluency in English (written and spoken), Polish is a great plus.
• IT skills: Outlook and Word: basic; Excel and PowerPoint: advanced
• Competencies also for hybrid teams (remote teams)
• People Connector – inclusive mindset and team player living DEI standards
• Regular travel required (30% within a year across Central/Eastern Europe)