Buyer - Seasonal Dresses & Tops in Wilmslow

We are Sosandar, an award-winning Women’s fashion brand based in Wilmslow, Cheshire. We’re one of the UK’s fastest growing online fashion brands for chic and stylish women, worn by celebs and influencers galore. We have an amazing opportunity for someone equally as amazing to join our growing team as a Seasonal Buyer encompassing Holiday, Occasion Tops and Dresses, Swim and Beachwear.

Working across Dresses & Tops, the ideal candidate will have experience of fashion Buying at mid-market and high street level alongside strong core planning, range building and analytical buying skills. A varied fashion background is required covering fast fashion in addition to bricks and mortar buying experience. As a Buyer for Sosandar, your commercial fashion eye is key. The Sosandar customer wants fashion commercial styles that are wearable for all occasions, has a wide appeal for all body types and shapes by using quality fabrics at affordable prices that enhance her wardrobe, all underpinned by not compromising on our fashion trend handwriting.

Holiday and Occasion Dresses & Tops are within our top 5 biggest revenue driving categories. The exciting part is there is still so much more potential. Our range of tops and dresses covers a wide range of fabrications under the Jersey and woven umbrella; therefore, the ideal candidate will have strong knowledge and experience of working with all types of fabrications and costings. This role requires a Buyer who thrives in a changing ‘growth’ environment and works well under pressure.

You will enjoy implementing processes for the benefit of the product teams to streamline working practices alongside the weekly and monthly planning and range building requirements. You will enjoy and have the skills to ‘get stuck into the detail’ to ensure best practices are implemented in the department and be prepared to ‘roll your sleeves up’ working at a low and high level with a positive attitude. There is an opportunity to be involved in various business projects alongside the day-to-day of the buying role.

What you’ll do:

• Plan quarterly with the merchandiser, clearly communicating lessons learnt, plan of action and delivering robust analytical plans to drive out commercial ranges for Own site as well as external 3rd parties.
• Deliver a balanced range across fabric, shape, print and colour owning the attribution of your range to ensure accuracy and consistency and be responsible for the data filling within the systems and range plans.
• Manage the weekly buy for your areas alongside the designer ensuring all samples are reflective of the original design work, costed to BIM targets and able to hit the required intake dates.
• Trade weekly – ensuring forward stock is reflective of weekly trading patterns, managing the intake to ensure stock is landing at the right time.
• Manage the online sales performance alongside the stores performances and 3rd parties.
• Spot missed opportunities, product trends and identify why something is a best or worst seller.
• Be responsible for critical path, ensuring all team members are utilising the critical path effectively.
• Have a strong commercial eye, able to understand the brand's vision and able to put our customer at the forefront of every product decision.
• Ensure the customer is at the heart of all decisions from colour, print, design and fitting of the garment.
• Strong skill in understanding women’s body shapes and what makes a ‘perfect’ garment for them.
• Ability to read analytical data to drive out strategic buying actions, implementing the actions quickly and efficiently.
• Contribute to our trend forum encouraging all levels of the product team to have a voice, helping keep the focus on the customers’ requirements.
• Deliver to the revenue, BIM and returns targets set by the Senior Management team.
• Manage supplier relationships – identifying risks and opportunities alongside the technical, design and sourcing teams.
• Run production and capacity planning to ensure we deliver the best BIM whilst staying flexible in season.
• Hold strong knowledge of jersey and woven bases and how they perform with different printing methods.
• Understand factory print capabilities to ensure the right method is selected for production.

Who we’re looking for:

• A commercial fashion eye (non-negotiable).
• Experience in trading a department to maximise sales, ideally with eCommerce and bricks and mortar experience.
• Analytical and creative thinker.
• Able to work with Excel spreadsheets whilst spotting the latest winner.
• Able to work under pressure whilst managing a ‘changing’ environment as we grow – positive solution-focused attitude when managing yours and teams workload.
• Strong communication skills to ensure Buying Director and key Management teams are kept up to date and informed.
• The ability to problem-solve under pressure in a fun, fast-paced environment.
• Enjoys change, open to new ways of working.
• Identifies new ways of working that fit the business as it continues to grow.
• Able to take responsibility and make independent decisions.
• Effective time management and the ability to prioritise.
• Understands/has experience with the ‘test and repeat’ eCommerce buying model.
• Be confident in Excel and PowerPoint.
• Holds a clean and valid UK driving licence.
• Creative commercial eye is as important as data-led accurate decision making.

Please note that this role requires some travel to Europe and Far East as and when required by the business.

What’s in it for you?

• 25 days paid holiday pro-rata, plus bank holidays, plus your birthday off!
• Holiday buy scheme.
• 40% employee discount.
• Hybrid working - Mondays and Fridays typically at home.
• 4% employer pension via salary sacrifice.
• Employee Assistance Programme (private GP consultations, prescriptions, physiotherapy, counselling, shopping discounts) for you, your partner and kids.
• Life Assurance 4x your salary.
• Weekly hours: 35 per week.

As an equal opportunities employer, we celebrate our differences and know that as a team we thrive in a diverse and inclusive environment. Sosandar, therefore, very much welcomes applications from all individuals. Think you tick all the boxes? Great, we want to hear from you! Please send us your CV and a covering letter to careers@sosandar.com telling us why Sosandar and you are the perfect fit.