Category Manager

Requisition ID: 185996

Career Group: Corporate Office Careers

Job Category: Category Merchandising - Grocery

Travel Requirements: 0 - 10%

Job Type: Full-Time

Country: Canada (CA)

Province: Nova Scotia; Alberta; Ontario

City: Stellarton, Calgary, Edmonton, Mississauga

Location: Foord St. Office, Calgary Office, Edmonton Office, King St. Office, 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.

Here’s Where You’ll Be Focusing

Lead Assistant Category Managers (ACMs)

• Support the banner merchandising strategies and drive both customer loyalty and sales growth through effective assortment, pricing, promotions, placements and use of customer insights;
• Coach, train and mentor Assistant Category Managers to develop category plans, implement category strategies and manage vendor relationships;
• Work with the ACMs to execute category plans that meet the needs of the banners within each geographic region;
• Coordinate and lead quarterly Joint Business Planning meetings between the vendors and the ACMs;
• Inspire product and program innovations from the Category Management teams and the vendors;
  
  

Lead overall strategy for category

• Responsible to establish category level margin budgets that meet the targets of the regional banners;
• Set performance targets for categories including: sales, promotional mix, shrink;
• Manage promotional and category sales mixes to achieve banner targets by geographic region and store format;
• Translate strategic category plans into tactical merchandising activities;
• Identify opportunities in-line with consumer trends and banner strategies;
• Communicate category performance to operational leadership teams across the country;
• Maintain a clear understanding of department programs being executed by competitors;
• Ensure a high level of personal and team education on department strategies and tactics being executed in North America and Europe, including the growth of ethnic assortments;
• Drive traffic sales and cross traffic shopping with food business;
  
  

Direct the execution of merchandising categories

• Work with category peers to establish quarterly and annual promotional plans;
• Direct the category promotion-pricing strategies and weekly ad planning process;
• Hold Joint Business Plan meetings is accordance with the annual schedule;
• Build vendor relationships to enable effective Joint Business Planning and strategic planning;
• Conduct regular Category Reviews and Warranty Walks;
• Analyze category performance in the market place and at individual competitors;
  
  

Empower employees and develop top talent

• Create opportunities for skill development and career progression to develop talent.
  
  

What You Have To Offer

• Undergraduate degree and a minimum of 5 years of relevant experience;
• Experience in a purchasing, merchandising, retail, manufacturing or corporate environment;
• Strong negotiation skills;
• Ability to translate customer insights and market trends into actionable strategies;
• Ability to build relationships with vendors;
• Ability to weigh buying vs selling trade offs and make bold decisions;
• Be results driven; consider P&L impact;
• Be highly data oriented with strong analytical abilities.
  
  

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.