Architectural & Design Business Development Manager

italia ceramics; Adelaide; On-site; AUD 120,000 - 160,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Company car

Laptop provided

Product samples allocation

Job summary

Italia Ceramics seeks an Architectural & Design Business Development Manager in Adelaide to lead relationships with architects, interior designers, builders and developers. You will influence specifications for tile, stone and surface solutions and protect them through tender and construction.

You will build a new design-specification pipeline, open cold relationships to repeat business, and maintain CRM discipline while managing long-cycle sales and margin outcomes.

Qualifications

• Design literacy and ability to read architectural drawings and schedules.
• Proven record in long-cycle selling where influencer and payer are not the same.
• CRM discipline and ability to manage long-cycle sales processes.

Responsibilities

• Influence architectural and design specifications for tile, stone and surface solutions.
• Build and develop the specification channel within Adelaide's architectural and design community.
• Open relationships from a cold start and turn them into repeat business
• Protect specifications through tender and construction to supply
• Set your own week and be accountable for results
• Maintain CRM discipline and manage long-cycle sales processes
• Propose alternatives that hold a scheme together
• Manage commercial outcomes expressed in margin and specifications secured

Skills

Design literacy

Architectural drawings

Color & materials knowledge

Long-cycle selling

CRM discipline

New business development

Relationship building

Tools

CRM software

Pricing tools

Job description

Architectural & Design Business Development Manager

Italia Ceramics has supplied premium tile, stone and surface solutions to South Australia's most discerning builders, architects, interior designers and homeowners for over fifty years. The company is family-owned and in the middle of the largest investment in its history.

About the role

This is a newly shaped appointment to own the relationship with Adelaide's architectural and design community. Premium projects are won or lost long before an order is placed — at the moment a surface is written into a finishes schedule, often twelve to eighteen months out. You will be the company's presence inside architectural practices, interior design studios, builders and developers: influencing what gets drawn and scheduled, then protecting that specification through tender and construction to supply. You will report directly to the Sales Director with access to the Executive General Manager, in a business that is simultaneously rebuilding its systems and re-forming its range. The specification channel is deliberately under-developed — coverage of the design community has been incidental rather than systematic. There is no mature pipeline to inherit. You will build it.

Key responsibilities

• Influence architectural and design specifications for tile, stone and surface solutions
• Build and develop the specification channel within Adelaide's architectural and design community
• Open relationships from a cold start and turn them into repeat businessProtect specifications through tender and construction to supply
• Set your own week and be accountable for results
• Maintain CRM discipline and manage long-cycle sales processes
• Propose alternatives that hold a scheme together
• Manage commercial outcomes expressed in margin and specifications secured

About you

• Design literacy — ability to hold your own in a conversation with a practising interior designer about a scheme
• Ability to read architectural drawings, floor plans, elevations and finishes schedules
• Real fluency in colour, material, finish, format, scale, and how surfaces behave in natural and artificial light
• Understanding of how a surface selection sits alongside joinery, tapware, lighting, flooring and the wider material palette
• Proven record in long-cycle selling, where the person who influences the decision and the person who pays are not the same
• Ability to open relationships from a cold start and turn them into repeat business
• Commercial literacy expressed in margin, not just revenue
• Genuine self-direction
• Demonstrated CRM discipline
• Competitive base salary, plus a deliberately simple incentive tied to specifications secured and margin delivered
• Motor vehicle, laptop, mobile and a full sample allocation
• Direct line to the Sales Director, and access to the Executive General Manager on project pricing and range decisions
• Real influence over what the company ranges, at a moment when those decisions are being actively re-formed
• Product and technical development, including supplier and factory exposure in Italy and Asia where approved
• Fifty-year South Australian reputation to sell behind