ROSS SMITH
Bloomington,MN
Summary
Results-orientated manager with over 10 years’ experience in account management, retail sales, business development, demand planning and merchandise analysis. Proven track record of building strong relationships with vendors and customers and achieving sales goals. Adept at analyzing data to identify trends, and leading successful teams with initiative, strategic solutions.
Overview
12
12
years of professional experience
Work History
Merchandise Analyst
Best Buy
11.2021 - Current
- Manage and plan financials for a $2B business segment in Premium Laptops
- Use supply picture, ASP’s, and co-funding created weekly promotional plans to maximize profitability and market share, strategize areas to develop, to meet budget
- New Product Introduction, Marketing, Sale Events and Promotional planning for Premium Laptops
- Working collaboratively with vendor partners from Apple, Microsoft, Dell and Lenovo on roadmaps, product introductions, pricing, store merchandising, marketing activities, and promotional strategy
- Partner with Category Marketing to analyze customer trends, click rates, and optimize messaging to grow TAM.
Demand Planner/Forecaster
Best Buy
08.2019 - 10.2021
- Led Premium Laptops supply chain efforts to meet internal and vendor sales targets
- Maintained sales to achieve budget with lowest ever EOY FDOS (35 FDOS on a goal of 42 FDOS) through accurate forecasting and vendor partnership to align on sales plan for JIT inventory delivery
- Minimizing Owned Inventory and optimize cash flow
- Created roadmaps for laptops business, allowing accurate planning for parts procurement in a constrained environment post-covid
- Long-term planning helped decrease parts delays, making supply more predictable, increasing efficiency
- Created tools to track weekly/monthly/quarterly receipt expenses across laptops categories so that we could align to Total Computing EI, COGS, and receipt expenses
- Created transition inventory trackers to identify areas that would need investment to hit new product lifecycle timelines
- Executed best-in-class forecast accuracy of >90% by accurately calculating YoY demand declines in pandemic related goods using quantitative data from LY and LLY.
Analyst, Space Management
Best Buy
08.2017 - 07.2019
- Tasked with managing a new fulfillment-based store concept that was extremely successful and will now be expanded to improve service for 65% of Best Buy customers and improve fulfillment on 80% of sales
- Created & maintained over 250 planogram versions with more than 2700 SKUs, optimizing the presentation and “shop-ability” of product worth more than $400M a year
- Collaborated with over 50 cross-functional partners to execute merchandising strategies to drive business
- Maximized return on space dollars through Space to Sales analysis, 95/5 reporting, and merchandising updates
- Created merchandising strategies for “Future Store” to drive newer, easier, and more exciting in-store experience for customers
- Solved a merchandising problem with future store fixtures saving 20+ SKUs and over $7M a year
- Created tools to improve operational processes, store reset accuracy and reduce wasted labor hours.
Specialty Sales Consultant and account manager
Pacific Kitchen and Home
05.2015 - 07.2017
- Refined PAC processes and merchandising through corporate partnerships
- Consulted with customers to identify needs and elegant solutions to optimize the customer experience
- Liaise with customers, designers, vendors, installers and contractors to execute flawless installation
- Developed a coaching team to grow referral business and help leaders deliver on eVoice goals
- Consistently led PAC Sales Part-Timers in Sales performers, coming close to $1M writer (typically only achieved by Full-Time employees).
Account Manager
Bestbuy Retail
04.2012 - 05.2015
- Managed 3 Top 40 performers
- 12th ranked SPU NPS, 40th ranked BBYM Revenue, 1st in M12 Front End GSP & NPS
- Monitored controllable expenses via P&L
- Slashed Erosion from >10% to
Education
Bachelors: Finance & International Business -
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
05.2018
Skills
- Analytical Thinking
- Team Collaboration and Leadership
- Full Microsoft Office suite
- Retail Merchandising
- Data Analysis
- SQL
- SAP
- PowerBI
Timeline
Merchandise Analyst
Best Buy
11.2021 - Current
Demand Planner/Forecaster
Best Buy
08.2019 - 10.2021
Analyst, Space Management
Best Buy
08.2017 - 07.2019
Specialty Sales Consultant and account manager
Pacific Kitchen and Home
05.2015 - 07.2017
Account Manager
Bestbuy Retail
04.2012 - 05.2015
Bachelors: Finance & International Business -
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
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