Director, Category Strategy & Insights

Wellness Pet Company; Burlington (MA); Hybrid; USD 163,000 - 248,000; Full time

Job summary

Wellness Pet Company is seeking a Director of Category Management to lead our category strategy and retailer insights within the Commercial organization. You will oversee a cross-functional team and partner with Sales, Marketing, Brand, Finance, IT to drive growth through data-driven insights.

You will translate syndicated data and POS/shopped data into strategic recommendations, lead executive presentations, and own the data infrastructure alongside IT, including Power BI adoption.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Marketing, Analytics, or a related field; MBA preferred.
• 10+ years of progressive experience in Category Management, Shopper Insights, Commercial Analytics, Sales Strategy, or a related CPG discipline.
• Proven leadership experience managing and developing high-performing teams.
• Strong strategic, analytical, and communication skills, with the ability to influence senior internal and external stakeholders.
• Deep experience with syndicated data such as IRI/Circana, Nielsen, as well as customer-provided POS and shopper data.
• Proven ability to translate data and insights into commercial strategies that drive business results.
• Expert-level skills using Microsoft Excel, Power BI, or similar business intelligence platforms.
• Strong understanding of category management fundamentals, including assortment, merchandising, pricing, promotion, competitive analysis, and shelf optimization.
• Proven experience developing and delivering compelling customer-facing selling stories and executive presentations.
• Successful experience managing and ensuring compatibility of large data sets across multiple platforms and establishing a consistent source of truth.
• Strong business acumen and ability to connect category insights to revenue, profit, and market growth.
• Well-organized and able to manage multiple competing and shifting priorities and deadlines.

Responsibilities

• Lead the category management and retailer insights strategy within Commercial organization.
• Oversee a team of category management professionals and collaborate cross-functionally with Sales, Marketing, Brand, Finance, and IT.
• Serve as a senior category management partner to internal leadership and external retail customers; lead customer presentations and board-facing materials.
• Analyze syndicated, POS, shopper, and consumer data to inform assortment, merchandising, pricing, promotion, and competitive performance.
• Lead analysis of business and channel performance to optimize strategies and investments.
• Oversee post-promotional analysis including ROI and Lifetime Value, translating findings into recommendations.
• Own the evolution of Wellness’ commercial data and reporting capabilities; partner with IT to advance Power BI and other analytics.
• Lead, coach, develop, and retain a high-performing category management team.
• Establish a proactive market intelligence approach and communicate opportunities/risks to senior leadership.
• Partner with Sales, Marketing, Brand, Finance, IT to translate insights into measurable results.

Skills

Category management

Data analytics

Leadership

Stakeholder influence

Cross-functional collaboration

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Business, Marketing, Analytics, or related field

MBA preferred

Tools

Power BI

Excel

Job description

Wellness Pet Company is seeking a Director of Category Management to lead our category strategy and retailer insights within the Commercial organization. You will oversee a cross-functional team and partner with Sales, Marketing, Brand, Finance, IT to drive growth through data-driven insights.

You will translate syndicated data and POS/shopped data into strategic recommendations, lead executive presentations, and own the data infrastructure alongside IT, including Power BI adoption.