Senior Manager, Merchandising (Promotional Products)

Position Summary

The Senior Manager, Merchandising is a key leader within BDA’s merchandising organization, responsible for leading and developing a team of merchandising professionals and driving merchandising strategy and execution across assigned clients and categories.

Key Responsibilities

Team Leadership & Development

• Lead, coach, and develop a team of merchandising professionals, creating clear expectations, accountability, and ownership across the team.
• Establish team priorities and ensure resources are aligned to the clients, programs, and opportunities with the greatest business impact.
• Provide ongoing coaching, feedback, and development to strengthen merchandising capabilities and build future leaders within the organization.
• Set goals and performance expectations and hold the team accountable for delivering against client, financial, and operational objectives.
• Ensure the team effectively manages multiple clients, programs, product launches, and competing priorities in a fast-paced environment.
• Build a culture of collaboration, creativity, accountability, and continuous improvement.
• Partner with the Director, Global Merchandising on organizational structure, talent planning, capability development, and succession planning for the merchandising team.
• Identify opportunities to improve how the team works, including processes, tools, communication, and cross-functional ways of working.

Merchandising Strategy & Execution

• Lead the development and execution of merchandising strategies across assigned clients, programs, and product categories.
• Guide the team in building product assortments that reflect client brands, consumer needs, market trends, program objectives, and financial targets.
• Establish direction and priorities for seasonal, evergreen, event-driven, and client-specific merchandise programs.
• Review and challenge assortment strategies and product recommendations to ensure the right balance of creativity, brand relevance, financial performance, and execution.
• Identify opportunities to expand categories, improve product mix, introduce new products, and strengthen merchandise programs.
• Ensure merchandising strategies are effectively carried through from initial concept and product development to launch and ongoing program management.
• Partner with the Director, Global Merchandising to execute broader merchandising priorities and initiatives across the organization.

Client & Business Partnership

• Serve as a senior merchandising partner to NBD, Client Services, and key clients.
• Participate in client discovery sessions, strategic planning discussions, business reviews, product presentations, and new-business pitches.
• Guide the development of client product strategies, assortments, trend presentations, and category recommendations.
• Ensure the merchandising team understands each client's brand, consumer, business objectives, and program needs.
• Build strong relationships with client stakeholders and provide merchandising expertise and recommendations that strengthen BDA's partnerships.
• Partner with Client Services leadership to identify opportunities to grow existing programs and bring new ideas to clients.
• Support new-business opportunities by helping develop merchandising strategies and product solutions that differentiate BDA.

Product Performance & Financial Results

• Lead the merchandising team's review of sales, margin, inventory, sell-through, in-stock performance, and other key business measures.
• Use performance data, client insights, and market trends to identify opportunities and guide merchandising decisions.
• Ensure the team understands the financial impact of assortment, product, pricing, and inventory decisions.
• Identify opportunities to improve sales, margin, inventory productivity, and overall program performance.
• Partner with Merchandise Planning and Purchasing to align merchandising strategies with forecasts, inventory plans, replenishment strategies, and purchasing decisions.
• Lead regular business and assortment reviews to evaluate performance, identify risks, and establish actions.
• Escalate significant business risks and opportunities to the Director, Global Merchandising and appropriate cross-functional leaders.
• Ensure the team follows through on actions and recommendations identified through performance reviews.

Cross-Functional Leadership

• Build strong partnerships across NBD, Client Services, Design, Global Sourcing, Merchandise Planning, Purchasing, Operations, Logistics, and Compliance.
• Ensure merchandising priorities and product strategies are clearly communicated across functions.
• Partner with Global Sourcing on product capabilities, vendor opportunities, costing, lead times, quality, and production considerations.
• Partner with Design to ensure product collections and presentations effectively bring client brands and campaigns to life.
• Work closely with Merchandise Planning and Purchasing to align assortment decisions with demand, inventory, and purchasing strategies.
• Partner with Operations and Logistics to identify and resolve issues that could impact product availability, timing, quality, or client commitments.
• Help resolve cross-functional issues and establish clear ownership when decisions or actions span multiple teams.
• Represent the merchandising team in cross-functional meetings and initiatives as needed.

Trends, Product & Innovation

• Ensure the merchandising team maintains a strong understanding of retail, consumer, apparel, lifestyle, cultural, and promotional merchandise trends.
• Identify emerging categories, products, materials, decoration techniques, and market opportunities relevant to BDA clients.
• Guide the team in translating trends into relevant product ideas and client opportunities.
• Partner with Design and Global Sourcing to bring new products, capabilities, and ideas into BDA's merchandise offering.
• Maintain strong knowledge of the competitive landscape and identify opportunities for BDA to differentiate its product solutions.
• Attend tradeshows, vendor meetings, market visits, showrooms, and other opportunities to identify and showcase new products and trends.
• Encourage the team to continuously bring forward new ideas and challenge existing assortments and approaches.

Qualifications & Experience

• Bachelor's degree in Merchandising, Business, Marketing, Design, or related field preferred.
• 7+ years of progressive experience in merchandising, product development, category management, retail, consumer goods, or promotional merchandise.
• 3+ years of experience leading and developing people and teams.
• Demonstrated experience leading merchandising strategies, product assortments, and category initiatives.
• Strong understanding of product development, sourcing, merchandise planning, purchasing, inventory management, and production timelines.
• Experience using sales, margin, inventory, and product performance data to drive decisions and actions.
• Demonstrated ability to lead through others, establish priorities, and hold teams accountable for results.
• Strong client-facing and presentation skills with experience presenting strategies and recommendations to senior stakeholders.
• Proven ability to build strong cross-functional relationships and influence across multiple teams.
• Strong organizational, communication, problem-solving, and decision-making skills.
• Experience working in a fast-paced environment managing multiple clients, programs, and priorities.
• Experience with merchandising, planning, ERP, PLM, or related systems preferred.
• Experience in branded merchandise, retail, consumer products, apparel, lifestyle products, or a related industry strongly preferred.

Key Leadership Competencies

• People Leadership: Builds strong teams, sets clear expectations, provides meaningful feedback, develops talent, and creates accountability for results.
• Merchandising Leadership: Brings strong product instincts, category knowledge, and merchandising expertise and uses that knowledge to guide the team and improve client programs.
• Client Partnership: Understands client brands and business objectives and helps the team translate them into strong merchandise strategies and solutions.
• Business & Financial Acumen: Understands how merchandising decisions impact revenue, margin, inventory, and overall program performance.
• Collaboration & Influence: Builds effective partnerships across functions and brings teams together around shared priorities and outcomes.
• Decision Making: Uses data, experience, and judgment to make decisions, establish priorities, and move work forward.
• Execution & Accountability: Creates clarity around ownership and expectations and ensures commitments are delivered.
• Change Leadership: Helps teams adapt to growth, changing priorities, new processes, and evolving client needs.