Merchandise Retail Planner at PHE, Inc. in Hillsborough, NC

Description:

Love numbers, spreadsheets, and figuring out what the data is telling you? We should talk!

We're looking for a detail-oriented, highly analytical Merchandise Retail Planner to help us make smarter decisions about inventory, sales, and profitability. This is a behind-the-scenes role for someone who genuinely enjoys working with numbers, digging into data, spotting trends, and figuring out the story behind the results. If you're naturally analytical, enjoy solving problems, and like knowing that your work has a direct impact on how a business operates, this could be a great fit.

What You'll Be Working On:

Financial Planning & Forecasting:

• Develop seasonal and annual financial plans for sales, gross margin, markup, inventory, receipts, and markdowns.
• Maintain weekly forecasts and monitor actual performance against planned goals.
• Analyze sales and margin trends to identify opportunities, potential risks, and areas that need attention.
• Partner with Category Managers, vendors, and Procurement on forecasts, budgets, open-to-buy, and inventory planning.
• Help ensure financial plans align with assortment strategies and overall business objectives.

Inventory & Replenishment:

• Monitor inventory levels and product availability across channels.
• Develop replenishment strategies and establish inventory targets.
• Track inventory turns, sell-through, weeks of supply, and excess inventory.
• Monitor incoming inventory, distribution center stock levels, and vendor delivery timelines.
• Identify slow-moving, overstocked, or underperforming products and recommend adjustments.
• Look for ways to improve inventory productivity while maintaining healthy stock levels.

Reporting & Business Analysis:

• Prepare weekly sales, margin, and inventory reports.
• Dig into the numbers to understand what's happening and why.
• Identify trends, discrepancies, opportunities, and potential problems before they become bigger issues.
• Analyze promotional performance and profitability.
• Conduct post-season analysis to help improve future planning.
• Track key performance indicators, including sell-through, inventory turns, GMROI, and forecast accuracy.
• Provide data-driven recommendations to support better business decisions.

Working Behind the Scenes With Other Teams:

• Work with Category Managers to support merchandise and financial planning.
• Coordinate with Supply Chain on inventory flow and delivery timelines.
• Partner with Ecommerce and Marketing to ensure inventory levels support promotional plans.
• Work with Finance and Procurement to keep forecasts and budgets aligned.
• Prepare and communicate reporting, findings, and recommendations to leadership.

Requirements:

What We're Looking For:

• 2–5+ years of experience in retail planning, merchandise planning, or allocation.
• Strong analytical and financial skills with the ability to interpret large amounts of data.
• Understanding of retail financial metrics, including gross margin, markup, open-to-buy, sell-through, inventory turns, and GMROI.
• Advanced Excel skills and confidence working with spreadsheets and reporting tools.
• Experience with planning systems such as Blue Yonder, Oracle, NetSuite, or Anaplan.
• Strong attention to detail and a natural ability to spot trends and inconsistencies.
• Ability to turn data into meaningful insights and recommendations.
• Good communication and organizational skills.

It Would Be Great If You Also Have:

• Experience in specialty ecommerce, wellness, beauty, consumer products, or similar industries.
• Experience working with large product assortments and high SKU counts.
• Experience forecasting inventory and receipts for private-label products or new product launches.
• Familiarity with merchandise planning, allocation, replenishment, or business intelligence systems.
• Experience working with domestic and international vendors, lead times, and inbound inventory.
• Experience planning inventory across ecommerce, marketplace, or omnichannel environments.

The Type of Person Who Will Thrive Here:

• Analytical by Nature: You enjoy working with numbers and aren't afraid to dig deep into the details.
• Detail-Oriented: You notice things others might overlook and take pride in getting the numbers right.
• A Problem Solver: You enjoy figuring out why something isn't working and finding a better way to approach it.
• Organized: You can manage multiple reports, deadlines, forecasts, and priorities without losing track of the details.
• Curious: You don't just look at the numbers; you want to understand what they mean.
• Collaborative: You're comfortable working behind the scenes with different departments to keep things running smoothly.

A Little About Us:

PHE, Inc., is the parent company of Adam & Eve – the nation’s largest adult retailer is based in Hillsborough, NC. PHE offers the opportunity to do meaningful, high-impact work in a community known for its character, creativity, and quality of life. We’re a company that takes care of its people, too, with a strong benefits package that includes health insurance, 401(k), half-day Fridays, performance bonuses, generous vacation time, and more.

This is a hybrid position (2 days in office/ 3 days a week WFH) based in Hillsborough, NC. Our office is located ~20 minutes from Durham or Chapel Hill and ~45 minutes from Raleigh.

Hiring Range: $65,000-$75,000 per year

• PHE, Inc. will reasonably accommodate qualified individuals with a disability so that they can perform the essential functions of a job unless doing so causes a direct threat to these individuals or others in the workplace and the threat cannot be eliminated by reasonable accommodation or if the accommodation creates an undue hardship to PHE, Inc.

EEO Statement: PHE, Inc. is an equal opportunity employer. PHE, Inc. offers equal opportunities to applicants and employees and makes all employment-related decisions based exclusively on job-related qualifications, without regard to characteristics such as race, color, national origin, religion, gender, age, marital status, disability, veteran status, citizenship status, sexual orientation, gender identity, political affiliation and/or any other status protected by law.