Merchandise Manager - New Partnerships

Activate Talent; South Africa; Remote; ZAR 480,000 - 720,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading company is seeking a Merchandise Manager for New Partnerships to enhance their brand portfolio. This remote role will involve strategic relationship management with vendors, detailed onboarding processes, and collaboration with marketing teams to ensure successful brand launches. The ideal candidate will possess strong organizational and communication skills, be detail-oriented, and thrive in a collaborative, remote work environment.

Qualifications

• Undergraduate degree or minimum 3 years relevant experience required.
• Strong problem solving and critical thinking skills.
• Ability to communicate effectively across all levels.

Responsibilities

• Recruit new brands and onboard vendors for the Lightopia business.
• Coordinate marketing assets and ensure a good site experience.
• Maintain relationships with merchandising and marketing teams.

Skills

Strategic thinking

Communication

Organization

Problem solving

Collaboration

Education

Undergraduate degree in Business Administration, Merchandising, Marketing or related field

Minimum 3 years relevant work experience

Tools

Microsoft Office

Netsuite

Job description

Schedule: Monday to Friday, 8:00am to 5:00pm

Location: 100% Remote in South Africa

Contract: Independent Contractor

What You'll be Doing

The Merchandise Manager, New Partnerships will support a key strategic initiative to aggressively recruit new brands to the portfolio, reporting to the Director of Merchandising,

As Merchandise Manager on a Typical Day, You'll

• Support the Lightopia business by targeting a provided list of 90-100 Lighting vendors to secure partnerships.
• After firming up terms and conditions, quickly onboard vendors, setting them up in the system, obtaining the item setup form for processing.
• Coordinate the on-site launch, submitting creative briefs for the banner and ensuring a good site experience.
• Communicate new brand story and pass key marketing assets to the Merchandising and Marketing teams for launch campaign.
• Pass continued relationship management off to the Merchandising Team.

What You Bring to the Role

• Sense of urgency.
• Ability to take ownership and drive results.
• Exceptional reliability and follow through.
• Being proactive with communication, as we work on remote teams.
• Extremely organized.
• Ability to think strategically and act tactically with excellent attention to detail.
• Tenacity and grit to work through big ideas and problem solve down to the minute details.
• Professionalism in written and verbal communication. Ability to communicate and present to all levels in the organization.
• High participation in work sessions via Zoom or MS Teams, as we work in a highly collaborative environment.

Qualifications and Requirements

• Undergraduate degree in Business Administration, Merchandising, Marketing or related field, or minimum 3 years relevant work experience.
• Strong critical thinking, problem solving skills.
• Able to build collaborative relationships with internal and external partners.
• Sense of urgency, detail oriented, and able to provide clear and thorough communication.
• Express ideas precisely, persuasively, and effectively.
• Must be able to operate independently with minimal daily supervision.
• Commitment to and passion for continuous improvement.
• Experience with the following systems is preferred – Microsoft Office, Netsuite

Our Purpose and Growth Culture:

We are taking deliberate action to cultivate an inclusive culture that is grounded in our company purpose, to tie spaces together with meaningful design. We act with a growth mindset, take an expansive approach to what’s possible and believe in continuous learning to improve our business and ourselves. We focus on four key core values:

• Team First - we collaborate and support each other
• Whatever It Takes - we get it done
• Win On Service - we do right by our customers
• Be Curious - we seek creative, data-driven solutions