Merchandise Planner

Blue Bungalow; Brisbane; On-site; AUD 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

Blue Bungalow, a growing Australian fashion retailer based in Brisbane, is seeking a commercially driven Merchandise Planner. You will develop and manage merchandise plans, forecast performance, optimise stock investment and identify opportunities to maximise sales and profitability.

You will work closely with Creative and Merchandise teams to understand why trends occur and decide what to do next, driving margin and stock efficiency in a fast-paced e-commerce environment.

Qualifications

• Experience in merchandise planning within fashion, footwear or related retail.
• Strong understanding of sales, gross margin, OTB, stock turn and markdowns.
• Experience forecasting, inventory investment and analysing trading performance.
• Advanced Excel skills and ability to translate data into insights.

Responsibilities

• Develop and maintain seasonal, monthly and weekly merchandise plans across sales, margin, stock and intake.
• Optimise Open to Buy (OTB) and align inventory with opportunities and financial targets.
• Build forecasts and identify risks and opportunities against plan.
• Analyse category, product, brand performance to support assortment planning.
• Translate data into actionable trading strategies and recommendations.

Skills

Merchandise planning

Forecasting

Open to Buy (OTB)

Excel

Data analysis

Retail experience

Tools

Excel

Style Arcade

Profit Peak

Job description

Join a growing Australian fashion retailer where your commercial thinking can make a real impact.

Blue Bungalow is a successful, growing Australian fashion retailer, known for helping women feel confident, comfortable and effortlessly stylish through a carefully curated range of fashion, footwear and accessories.

With a strong e-commerce presence, a loyal customer base and ambitious plans for continued growth, we’re looking for a talented and commercially driven Merchandise Planner to join our Brisbane-based team.

This is an exciting opportunity for someone who loves the numbers as much as the product, someone who can turn data into insights, insights into actions, and actions into improved business performance.

About the role

Working closely with the Creative and Merchandise teams, you’ll play a key role in delivering our sales, margin and inventory objectives.

You’ll be responsible for developing and managing merchandise plans, forecasting performance, optimising stock investment and identifying opportunities to maximise sales and profitability.

We’re looking for someone who doesn’t just report on what’s happened, but understands why it’s happened, what it means for the business and, most importantly, what we should do next.

What you’ll be doing:

Merchandise & Financial Planning

• Develop and maintain seasonal, monthly and weekly merchandise plans across sales, margin, stock and intake.
• Optimise Open to Buy (OTB), ensuring inventory investment aligns with commercial opportunities and financial objectives.
• Build robust forecasts and identify risks and opportunities against plan.
• Support assortment and range planning through analysis of category, product, brand and attribute performance.
• Analyse historical performance and apply learnings to future merchandise plans.

Trading & Performance Optimisation

• Monitor weekly trading performance, identifying sales trends, opportunities and underperformance.
• Translate data into clear commercial recommendations and actionable trading strategies.
• Partner with Buying to recommend replenishment, repeats, stock cancellations, rephasing and exit strategies.
• Identify opportunities to maximise full-price sales, improve gross margin and minimise markdown exposure.
• Analyse product performance, sell-through, stock cover and inventory productivity to drive better investment decisions.

Inventory & Stock Management

• Forecast inventory requirements to maintain availability while managing stock exposure.
• Optimise stock levels across core, seasonal and fashion product categories.
• Identify slow-moving and aged inventory, recommending proactive stock management and exit strategies.
• Support replenishment planning to maximise availability of high-performing and core products.
• Partner with the wider team to ensure stock intake supports demand, trading performance and cash flow objectives.

Reporting, Insights & Continuous Improvement

• Develop and maintain accurate, meaningful merchandise reporting and performance analysis.
• Ensure data accuracy, consistency and integrity to support confident commercial decision-making.
• Identify opportunities to improve planning tools, processes and reporting capabilities.
• Contribute to the development of scalable merchandise planning frameworks as the business grows.
• Collaborate across Buying, Finance, Operations and Marketing to align commercial plans and business priorities.

About you

You’re a commercially minded Merchandise Planner who combines strong analytical capabilities with a genuine passion for retail and product.

You enjoy working in a fast-paced environment where you can influence decisions, challenge thinking and see the results of your work.

You’ll bring:

• Demonstrated experience in merchandise planning, ideally within fashion, footwear, accessories or a related retail category.
• Strong understanding of retail financial metrics including sales, gross margin, OTB, stock turn, sell-through, stock cover and markdown.
• Experience developing forecasts, managing inventory investment and analysing trading performance.
• Advanced Excel skills, with the ability to work confidently with large datasets and translate information into meaningful insights.
• Strong analytical thinking, attention to detail and a commitment to data accuracy.
• The ability to identify commercial opportunities and confidently recommend actions.
• Excellent communication skills and the ability to work collaboratively across teams.
• A proactive, solutions-focused mindset and the confidence to challenge the status quo.
• Experience in e-commerce or a digitally led retail environment will be highly regarded.
• Advanced Excel and reporting capability, experience with style arcade and profit peak would be advantageous.

Above all, we’re looking for someone who takes ownership, asks the right questions and is motivated by delivering results.

Why join Blue Bungalow?

• Make a genuine impact: Your insights and recommendations will directly influence commercial decisions and business performance.
• Be part of a growing business: Join an established Australian fashion retailer with exciting opportunities ahead.
• Help shape the future: Contribute to the development of merchandise planning tools, processes and ways of working.
• Work collaboratively: Be part of a passionate, customer-focused team where ideas, initiative and commercial thinking are valued.
• See the results: Enjoy the opportunity to work close to the product, the customer and the commercial decisions that drive success.

Ready to make your mark?

If you’re passionate about merchandise planning, love turning numbers into commercial opportunities and want to be part of a growing Australian fashion business, we’d love to hear from you.