WHAT DOES AN ASSISTANT BUYER DO ?
The Assistant Buyer plays a pivotal role in retail operations by mentoring team members, analyzing performance reports to guide future strategies, and ensuring competitive pricing through market research. They maintain meticulous records, monitor inventory levels for optimal sales and margins, and contribute to brand strategy meetings with insights derived from comprehensive market analysis. Their responsibilities encompass providing detailed feedback for decision-making and ensuring timely communication with vendors to meet operational targets.
A Review of Professional Skills and Functions for Assistant Buyer
1. Assistant Buyer Duties
- Design-Building: Contribute to range build to hit agreed Reiss DNA, quality levels, and target margins.
- Planning: Forward plan new seasons to deliver ranges on time and in line with the set company calendar.
- Analysis: Perform market analysis and monitor sales, proposing appropriate actions.
- Collaboration: Work closely with the merchandising team to review department performance and develop areas for improvement.
- Project Management: Manage the critical path dates for buying, ensuring all deadlines are met.
- Process Management: Drive the approval process for lab dips and trims, etc., to ensure critical path dates are maintained.
- Relationship Management: Build and maintain close relationships with suppliers.
- Priority Management: Manage multiple priorities in a dynamic environment.
- Contract Management: Generate and maintain supply contracts for assigned areas of responsibility.
- Procurement: Generate and communicate RFPs (Request for Proposal) to the vendor community, ultimately making purchase recommendations to category managers based on optimal supply mix analysis.
2. Assistant Buyer Responsibilities
- Procurement: Taking materials orders from site contacts and placing them with local suppliers.
- Communication: Ensuring there is a good line of communication from placement of order to arrival on site.
- Order Management: Raise purchase orders, chasing suppliers for delivery dates.
- Notification: Let the site team know if there is an issue sourcing any materials required.
- Planning: Plan own workload and support other members of the team and main office.
- Forecasting: Communicate the impact of forecasted menu-driven changes in supply to internal and external business partners.
- Database Management: Maintain item and supplier information in the Denny’s purchasing database, ensuring all records are accurate and up to date.
- Liaison: Be a frequent point of contact for suppliers, distributors, product development, franchise partners, and quality assurance.
- Information Provision: Provide timely information regarding product specifications, volume requirements, delivery lead times, pricing, etc.
- Representation: Attend various meetings as category representative.
3. Assistant Buyer Job Summary
- Vendor Management: Set up all new vendors and create articles in accordance with the Buyer’s wishes on the merchandising management system.
- Communication: Ensure all communication between the Buyer and the supplier/brand is followed up in a timely way to ensure that the commercial priorities of the directorate are met.
- Compliance: Ensure all buys conform to the agreed OTB parameters set by the Buyer and Merchandise Planning Manager.
- Legal Liaison: Liaise with ABA Legal Department to ensure that all contracts are approved in a timely way and are in accordance with the agreement between the Buyer and the Supplier and also conform to ABA terms of business.
- Order Management: Ensure buys are placed on a timescale that is agreed, are set up accurately and communicated to suppliers so that on-time delivery is also achieved.
- Project Coordination: Liaise between supplier and brand and with ABA architects to ensure that all new shop in shop and brand fixtures are approved and installed to the agreed schedule and to the agreed ABA standard.
- Delivery Monitoring: Monitor progress of all deliveries to ensure that new collections are delivered.
- Logistics Coordination: Liaise with warehouse and logistics to ensure that goods are receipted as per agreements and can flow through to the shop floor.
- Pricing Management: Manage price changes as necessary both in and out of promotional periods.
- Recruitment Support: Support the recruitment of appropriate Assistant Buying Administrators in line with agreed organization structure.
4. Assistant Buyer Accountabilities
- Coaching: Coach and mentor each member of the Assistant team in line with the requests of the buyer based on their experience and position to ensure the directorate's objectives are met consistently.
- Reporting: Provide weekly and ad hoc reports on the Directorate's performance to assist in future decision-making.
- Analysis: Report information on brand performance, article sell-throughs, margin, and product rate of sale.
- Decision Support: Be prepared to offer recommendations on future commercial decisions based on analysis made.
- Market Analysis: Conduct regular local and regional market appraisals to ensure that all prices are competitive and consistent with the marketplace as a whole.
- Feedback: Feedback to the buyer on any anomalies found.
- Process Management: Ensure all articles are set up accurately and POs communicated to vendors on time and within agreed OTB parameters.
- Organization: Ensure that all records and files are kept in an organized and easy to find way to ensure business continuity at all times.
- Tool Management: Ensure reporting tools are always refreshed, allowing for easy continuous interrogation of business performance.
- Inventory Monitoring: Monitor stock and sell-through rates to ensure that business objectives are being adhered to and sales and Gross margin targets are achieved.
- Planning: Complete a Buying Plan for the area which total responsibility is given.
- Strategic Contribution: Be involved in all Directorate brand strategy meetings, contributing based on market and category knowledge and interpretation of past seasons' performance.
5. Assistant Buyer Functions
- Brand Coordination: Coordinate and develop brand relationships from a Marketing and Sales perspective, working on bespoke campaigns with brands.
- Meeting Management: Coordinate strategy meetings, minutes, and follow-up.
- Launch Planning: Develop launch plans for new brands, ensuring cohesive liaison with the Marketing and Brand Teams where appropriate.
- Communication: Provide timely updates to the Marketing, Commercial, and Brand Teams in relation to agreed activity for specific brands and their involvement in marketing events.
- Product Introduction Monitoring: Monitor new line introduction, supporting the Merchandising and Product Content teams to ensure on-counter dates are achieved.
- Commercial Advice: Work with the Commercial Team to advise in relation to stock ordering and delivery arrangements, including chasing of deliveries where applicable and updating the Supply Chain Team.
- Performance Review: Conduct range reviews with brands to ensure all SKUs in the business are performing in line with company expectations.
- Merchandising Collaboration: Work closely with Merchandising to ensure company KPIs are met in terms of aged and provision stock.
- Sales Monitoring: Monitor sales targets and forecasts, and report back to brands regarding the success/outcome of bespoke Marketing activities.
- Promotion Analysis: Gain a clear understanding of how promotions are working by brand and how activity is impacting the business.
- Approval Process: Sign off brands and/or products for newsletters and event activity.
- Bespoke Activity Liaison: Liaise with the Brand/Marketing Team regarding bespoke activity on a weekly basis.
- Relationship Development: Develop and maintain relationships at the very highest levels within the beauty industry.