Retail Manager - Dolce & Gabbana in Hounslow

Location: Mistral House / UK and IRE Airports

This role will be responsible for supporting Dolce & Gabbana in UK and IRE Airports.

CSA is a privately owned business dedicated to nurturing and developing high selective brands in the UK Travel Retail channel. Established in 1991, it is the foremost fragrance and cosmetics agency in the UK TR market. CSA's strength lies within its outstanding personnel team reflecting the company's ethos of retail excellence, passion, humanity, and fun.

The purpose of the Retail Manager role is to develop sales in your area according to the brand and company's policy. Working closely with Dolce & Gabbana you will be expected to manage employees and the overall efficiency of stores along with maximizing performance. You will be responsible for maximising sales and minimising costs, be an excellent leader and team player, with an eye for extra business opportunity. The role includes ensuring your staff give great customer service, monitoring the financial performance of the store as well as assuring the proper implementation of merchandising and overseeing pricing and stock control. Detailed financial analysis, ROI and management of the P&L.

KEY TASKS:

• Sales Performance
• Responsible for rostering, ensuring the Beauty Consultant budget is used effectively to maximise coverage in stores.
• Build the monthly and yearly sell-out objectives with the Brand Manager.
• Carrying out a detailed analysis of weekly/monthly sales figures for each store and studying their evolution, reporting results back to Brand Manager.
• Analyze per line/shop and provide reports to management with recommendations to increase retail sales and brand image.
• Setting qualitative and quantitative monthly sales targets according to the brands market situation, the previous year sales figures, plus the current, following the years promotion plan.
• Monitoring the Beauty Consultants sales figures.
• Evaluating monthly results to set sales in line with the Beauty Consultants performance.
• Making regular on-site visits to ensure sales performance are achieved.
• Identifying problems and proposing solutions.
• Merchandising & Stock
• Monitoring and managing with shop managers, and provide feedback to the Brand Manager on stock levels (OOS, Overstock, MDQ levels, discontinued products, etc.)
• Reporting to Brand Manager any issue with counter maintenance.
• Enhance DG image and retail excellence through respect of visual merchandising guidelines.
• Discussing assortment per retailer with the Brand Manager.
• Marketing Activities: Launches & Promotions
• Set up animations and promotional events in coordination with the Marketing team.
• Ensuring all novelties are successfully launched.
• Plan, order and monitor testers, POSM, GWP and promotional visuals per store within your allocated budget.
• Reaching qualitative and quantitative targets for each promotion.
• Setting the number of sales assistants for each promotion in line with the Brand Manager and brand budgets.
• Contacting promotion agencies to review business and opportunities.
• Before start of promotion, ensure all BC's have GWP/testers and sales targets.
• Checking the decoration during promotional events to guarantee it follows the guidelines.
• Monitoring sales results every day during promotions.
• Analyse promotional performance, report feedback for each promotional event and make recommendations on trade plan investment optimization.
• Team management
• Liaise with training team to ensure that Beauty Consultants attend the mandatory training courses and follow up on coaching sessions done by both trainers and retail managers.
• Collecting information from sales assistants to define customer needs.
• Setting up monthly targets to the Beauty Consultants, following up on a weekly/monthly basis.
• Motivate and coach Beauty Consultants to have excellent team spirit and be goal oriented.
• Selecting and recruiting new Beauty Consultants, managing their airside pass ID applications and onboarding process in conjunction with Head of People.
• Negotiating salaries and pay rises for Beauty Consultants in line with agreed budgets and Brand Manager approval.
• Organising annual performance appraisals for direct reports.
• Organising and coordinating BC seminars together with DG management team.
• Ensuring grooming standards as per CSA/brands policies are adhered to.
• Recommend work hours and shift allocations by store both for permanent and temporary Beauty Consultants, utilising CSA's flexible team where possible for temporary staffing liaising with the flexi team Retail Manager.
• Book temporary staff for promotions through agencies and control expense budget.
• Relationship with local teams and competition
• Create and maintain contact with the main people at the airport (Beauty Trading Manager, Outer Stores Leader, Customer Service Leader, etc.)
• Liaise with them regarding merchandising, assortment, or logistics issues.
• Negotiate locally more visibility and space for promotions, TREX and tactical products. Identify new opportunities for door opening.
• Monitor and analyse the competitors' markets, products, and merchandising tools in the field.
• Regularly reporting to the Brand Manager on competition and consumers' feeling.
• Report any major changes within the airport (traffic, flights, shop trends).

PERSON SPECIFICATION:

• Qualifications: Educated to GCSE standard of English and Maths (or equivalent).
• Relevant Experience:
• Retail sales experience in a supervisory or managerial position.
• Experience of managing a team.
• Working with budgets (up to P&L level) and targets.
• Analysis of the retail market.
• Resource management including recruitment.
• Relationship management with brand clients.
• Aptitude, Skills and Abilities:
• Key financial acumen in terms of managing and implementing P&L.
• Excellent people management skills with the ability to generate credibility and respect.
• Ability to motivate others to achieve overall targets.
• Aptitude for coaching and mentoring.
• Good organisational skills with the ability to multitask.
• Excellent administration and presentation skills (including Excel, Word, Power Point, Outlook knowledge).
• Ability to build relationships with people at all levels.
• Aptitude for strategic thinking and planning.
• Leadership skills.
• Problem solving skills with an aptitude for being solution driven.
• Aptitude for marketing creativity and ideas for promotions and incentives.
• Excellent communication skills, both verbal and written (English language).
• Behavioural Competencies:
• Passionate about travel retail and a customer service champion.
• Demonstrates enthusiasm and drive for excellence.
• Leads by example.
• Motivated by team achievements and development of others.
• Shows a proactive approach to problems, always looking for the best solution.
• Demonstrates confidence in own ability.
• Involves others in decision making.
• Open to feedback and ideas for improvement.
• Uses strategies to achieve personal and team goals.
• Personable with a professional approach.

Weekly working hours - 37.5 hours per week (Monday-Friday)