Franchise & Wholsesale Trading Manager

Who we are:
Agent Provocateur, founded in 1994 in Soho, is a pioneering luxury lingerie brand known for fearless femininity and boundary-pushing design. Created by women and made for everyone, it uses exclusive fabrics, intricate details and bold storytelling to redefine empowered sensuality. With a global presence and boutiques in London, New York, LA and Paris, its decadent collections continue to challenge convention.

Purpose of the post:

Responsibility for management of Franchise and Wholesale partnerships. Ownership of end-to-end processes across onboarding new partners and channels, sales and presentation of new collections, fulfillment of orders, trading and planning. Owner of the relationship between Agent Provocateur and Franchise Partner/Wholesale Customer. Brand Ambassador and key interface between Partner and Agent Provocateur internal teams.

Main duties and responsibilities:

Trading, Planning & Assortment Management

• Proactively work with each Franchise Partner to review sales and stocks. Support partner to ensure they meet their seasonal and annual sales targets and planned sell through’s.
• Review of Franchise weekly sales. Compile the weekly trade summary to the wider business. Highlight actions within weekly trade to the Head of Franchise & Wholesale.
• Build seasonal Open to Buy Plans and work with Partners to agree and work to aligned planning frameworks.
• Build and maintain knowledge for each Franchise market understanding sales mixes across business metrics, for eg Category and Seasonality. Constant review of weekly sales at size and product level.
• Proactively ensure re-orders are maximised through effective review of weekly sales. Maintain department KPI to ensure re-orders are fulfilled.
• With the Head of Franchise & Wholesale, review of Partner Forward Orders to ensure they align to seasonal plans and metrics. Maximise the opportunity across categories and collections. Propose actions to orders to protect the opportunity.
• Working with the AP Merchandising team and Partner, build opening stock packages for new territories outside of Forward Orders. Ensure opening packages are optimised to realise each opportunity.
• Ensure Brand consistency via visual display and web placement. Work with the Agent Provocateur Visual Merchandising team to support this.
• Drive weekly, quarterly and/or seasonal trade reviews with Partners and Wholesale customers. Identify actions to drive sales and relationships.
• Maintain commercial acumen behind all actions and decisions made.
• Regularly visit Partner stores and regions to support relationship management and drive sales.

Selling Campaign & Critical Path Management: 

• Full management of order system JOOR, including seasonal digital collection presentation, order import and end/in- season reporting.
• Manage and support the critical path selling campaign process.
• Commercially, manage the process of selling, to ensure we sell collections via sample sets showcasing product in its optimum.
• Effectively present and sell our collections to set up for success and meet agreed sales targets.

Order & Delivery Management:

• Seasonal order book management for Partners via our in-house order systems. Oversee process of order confirmations, invoices, debits and credits.
• Oversee allocations for Partners, ensuring 100% fulfilment. Daily review of available stock working to collection and shipping parameters.
• Responsible for proactively ensuring there are no shortfalls or stock loss.
• Minimise any excess stock to identify and action accordingly. Manage weekly review of the stock.
• Communication of deliveries, delays and updates back to Partners on an ongoing basis.
• Oversee dispatches to partners ensuring on time handovers/deliveries.
• Ensure all export documentation is compliant to the Country of delivery.
• Oversee invoicing process for Partners. Ensure all invoices are accurate and sent on time, in accordance with financial calendars.
• Liaison between Credit Control and Finance teams to facilitate accurate and timely shipments within credit limits.
• Internal liaison with Logistics team and direct liaison with warehouses located in EU, US and UK.
• Oversee and manage the weekly order status report updating the Head of Franchise & Wholesale of any changes.
• Via the weekly delivery meeting, identify any delivery changes to determine best course of action to minimise loss to orders.

Other: 

• Support marketing activations and seasonal plans. Work closely with the Retail & Partnerships Marketing Manager to ensure we maximise opportunities with Franchise Partners and share best practice.
• Liaison with product teams, sharing detailed seasonal product feedback. Update the wider business as and when required.
• Review of the Department Inbox and Joor networking tool to highlight and follow up on potential stockists and Franchise requests.
• Maintain Franchise Guideline packs and practice governance, where possible, to ensure Partners are adhering to framework.
• Maintain department guides and manuals to support the internal, best practice of the team.
• Supervision, management and development of the Sales Executive. Assign tasks and priorities to effectively manage deadlines, execution of standards and productivity.
• Share best practice within the Franchise & Wholesale team leading with example and offering development/training where relevant.
• An excellent communicator, able to get best out of internal and external relationships.

Benefits:

• 25 days annual leave entitlement, plus bank holidays each year
• Generous staff discount across a variety of brands
• Auto-enrolment into the company pension scheme
• Cycle-to-work scheme
• Seasonal ticket loan
• Charity time-bank scheme
• Ability to purchase additional annual leave