AVP, Merchandising - VS Beauty

Why You Belong Here

At Victoria’s Secret & Co, you’ll join a world-leading specialty retail brand recognized globally for innovation and excellence in lingerie and fashion. You’ll work alongside industry leaders to set the standard for what a retail brand can achieve, placing customers at the center of everything we do to create products and experiences that bring them joy.

We believe everyone deserves a place where they truly belong. We celebrate individuality and know that your passion, experience, and unique perspective strengthen our team and business. Here, you’ll be empowered to perform, grow, and engage through unmatched opportunities to develop your skills, gain real-world experience, and learn from the best in the business.

Your Role:

Victoria’s Secret is one of the best beauty companies in the business, and an integral part of the best lingerie brands in the world. Here’s your chance to be part of our amazing team.” 20 Fragrance Foundation Awards, 4 fragrances in the top 15 and The #1 fragrance in America.

The Associate Vice President, Merchandising inspires the merchant team to develop a merchandising/commercialization strategy that is incorporated into the annual business plan. They are the brand builder and editor who owns the realization of the strategic view of the line.

Your Impact:

Strategy

• Directs and oversees the execution of the Beauty Merchandising strategy to meet the beauty business unit/company-wide profit and growth goals for the year

• Leads the merchant team to develop businesses that embody a category-wide merchandising perspective and correctly anticipate the next key item and creates distortion to optimize the potential of that future trend

• Help fuel the product innovation pipeline working closely with Product Development, Innovation, Design & Sourcing teams on identifying hero products of tomorrow

• Leverages retail experience and expertise in intimately understanding the brand, the competition, the target customer, the brand-specific product & category trends, financial ramifications of merchandising decisions, and is effective at building consensus to move ideas forward

• Leads the merchandising team in its role to collaborate with Product Development, Design, Merchandise Planning and Visual teams to manage the merchandise for the company by developing, distorting and merchandising product consistent with the Brand which consistently and predictably drives sales and profits

• Collaborate with VS Intimates team to ensure Beauty is strongly integrated into the broader brand messaging each season

• Directly influences the category teams in translating customer, competitor and merchandise knowledge into action

Builds Revenue

• Creates a compelling vision for beauty merchandising in the future, recognizing its implications for the critical initiatives of the business

• Conceptualizes and communicates short and long-range beauty merchandise strategies that support the business' brand position

• Understands and remains sensitive to the target customers' purchasing trends, attitude, lifestyle and aspirations

• Leads the team to find innovative ways to manage business that will increase opportunities for inventory control, improved margins and decreased markdowns

• Leads the team to develop assortment roadmaps to achieve financial goals and to maximize volume, based on concept and theme

• Influences their merchant team to develop financial plan, budget scenarios and merchandise models to establish and deliver sales, gross margin and profit objectives

• Shops the market to identify and analyze trends while always staying abreast of competitor's product selection strategies

Builds Talent

• Exemplary leadership skills to lead and inspire merchant and cross functional teams: Adjusts leadership style to meet the needs of different individuals/teams, flexing to be evaluative, analytical, supportive and encouraging as appropriate

• Demonstrates ownership and accountability for succession management and top talent development, meets regularly with direct reports to assess development progress and ensures talent gaps are resolved to support business growth strategies

• Creates open channels of communication among the category teams to inspire them to deliver product consistent with strategic objectives

• Directs customer and competitive patterning activities

Builds Organizational Capability

• Influential collaborative leader with cross functional partners (Product Development, Design, Product Innovation, Sourcing, Merchandise Planning) to create consensus on the annual product development roadmap & direction

• Promotes open channels of communication with Merchandise Planning and Allocation on historical and current sales analyses in order to determine key item base, breadth of selection and effective product allocation

• Directs team on best approach to maximize customer impact and guides them in providing product information to Marketing for visual presentation, creative advertising and promotional plans

Click here for benefit details related to this position.

VS&Co provides a range of compensation for this role as shown. Your actual salary will be determined by a number of factors, including: your specific skills and experience, geographic region, or other relevant factors.

Your Experience:

• Bachelor's degree required

• 10+ years of experience in merchandising; preferably beauty and fragrance experience

• Direct experience as a senior merchandising executive

• Successful track record for high volume business growth and bottom-line results

• Profound understanding of vertically integrated retail operations

• Broad-based business acumen with the potential to grow to the GMM level

• High intelligence with a true entrepreneurial risk mentality

• Ability to innovate change through visionary thinking and strategic management

• A strong pulse on the beauty landscape with proven talent to create a cohesive product & category viewpoint

• Solid management experience with proven leadership ability

• Ability to lead and inspire with unquestionable integrity and trust

• Exceptional communication, influencing and negotiating skills

• Proven ability to identify, develop and retain top talent

• Systems and computer literate

We will consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with arrest records, conviction records, or other criminal histories, in a manner consistent with the requirements of any applicable state and local laws. Please see links: California Fair Chance Act, Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance, Philadelphia Fair Chance Law, San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance

An equal opportunity employer, we do not discriminate in hiring or terms and conditions of employment because of an individual’s race, color, religion, gender, gender identity, national origin, citizenship, age, disability, sexual orientation, marital status or any other protected category recognized by state, federal or local laws. We only hire individuals authorized for employment in the United States.