Head of Retail

We are a modern affordable luxury handbag brand, crafting timeless and elegant styles that are made to last. Founded with a vision to do things differently, we create handbags that empower women, are sustainably sourced and ethically made, and give back to those who need it most. These principles guide everything we do. We are committed to driving change, championing equality, and celebrating women. Through our permanent charity initiative, ‘A Bag, A Life’, every purchase funds lifesaving vaccines and medical treatments for children in need, in partnership with SOS Children’s Villages. To date, we have funded over 1,000,000 vaccines. Join us and be part of an award‑winning, purpose‑driven brand that fosters creativity, collaboration, and meaningful impact within the luxury industry.

The Head of Retail will lead and scale DeMellier’s retail strategy and operations, ensuring exceptional customer experiences, consistent brand execution, and strong commercial performance across all physical retail locations. This is a hands‑on leadership role requiring deep retail expertise, strong people leadership, and a sharp commercial mindset. You will work closely with E‑commerce, Marketing, Merchandising, Operations, and Customer Experience to deliver seamless omnichannel journeys and accelerate store contribution to overall business growth.

Main Responsibilities

• RETAIL STRATEGY & GROWTH: Own and deliver the retail strategy aligned to DeMellier’s brand and commercial goals. Drive sales growth, profitability, and productivity across the store network. Identify opportunities to optimise store performance through trading, merchandising, service, and operational excellence. Build annual and quarterly trading plans, including key moments, launches, activations, and clienteling priorities. Project manage new store launches end‑to‑end (from concept and timeline planning through to recruitment, training, VM setup, operational readiness and opening performance), partnering closely with internal teams and external suppliers. Lead on retail store strategy, including store location, closures, relocations, pop‑ups. ROI analysis per store and per format. Propose flexible formats (pop‑ups, seasonal stores, concessions).
• COMMERCIAL & KPIs: Own retail P&L performance and ensure strong forecasting and budgeting discipline. Track, analyse and improve key KPIs including: sales, conversion, AOV, UPT, footfall, repeat rate, and CRM capture. Lead weekly/monthly retail performance reviews and develop action plans to drive results.
• CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE & BRAND STANDARDS: Champion an elevated luxury customer experience across all stores. Ensure consistency of brand standards: service, styling, storytelling, VM, and store presentation. Collaborate with Marketing and VM to deliver high‑impact campaigns, launches, and in‑store experiences. Own clienteling strategy and performance, ensuring strong execution across all stores to improve CRM capture, repeat rate, and client lifetime value. Balance global brand consistency with local customer behaviours. Adapt service, staffing, and trading rhythms per market. Ensure local market insights inform retail strategy while preserving brand consistency.
• RETAIL OPERATIONS & TECH STACK OWNERSHIP: Ensure smooth store operations including staffing, scheduling, compliance, stock processes, cash handling, and health & safety. Responsible for day‑to‑day retail BAU, ensuring stores are consistently trading at peak performance and act as first point of escalation. Partner with Operations and Supply Chain teams to ensure stock availability, strong replenishment, and low shrinkage. Oversee store‑level execution of SOPs and ensure operational best practice.
• PEOPLE LEADERSHIP & TALENT DEVELOPMENT: Recruit, lead, develop, and retain high‑performing store teams. Build a culture of high standards, performance, and customer obsession. Define training programmes, service expectations, and coaching frameworks. Support Store Managers with leadership development, performance management, and succession planning.
• OMNICHANNEL COLLABORATION: Work closely with E‑commerce and Customer Experience to deliver a seamless omnichannel experience (Click & Collect, returns, cross‑channel CRM, etc.). Collaborate with Merchandising to ensure product strategy supports store demand and storytelling. Partner with Finance on budgeting, forecasting, and strategic investment decisions. Ownership of retail systems & tools. Use of data for faster decision‑making. Lead a test‑and‑learn approach to retail initiatives, ensuring agile experimentation and scalability as fashion luxury brands win on speed & precision.

What you’ll need:

• 10+ years of retail leadership experience in luxury fashion/accessories (multi‑site preferred).
• Proven track record driving strong commercial performance and improving KPIs.
• Experienced people leader with strong coaching, hiring, and team development capabilities.
• Confident managing retail P&L, budgets, and forecasting.
• Strong knowledge of luxury service standards, clienteling, and CRM strategy.
• Operationally rigorous, with strong attention to detail and ability to implement scalable processes.
• Highly collaborative, able to influence across functions and senior stakeholders.
• Comfortable in a fast‑paced, high‑growth environment with changing priorities.