The Director of Central Planning contributes to rue21's success by leading the target setting, promotional strategy, channel management, and special analytics for the company. This role aligns closely with the Merchandise Planning team, Merchandising, Finance, Ecommerce, and Marketing teams. The Director of Central Planning is a business driver and influencer who will play a key role in achieving and exceeding company financial targets. This role reports to the VP of Planning and is located in our Warrendale, PA office.

• Commits to supporting rue21’s vision, mission, and values of an inclusive environment and sets an example for their sphere of influence.

• Develop the strategic/target top down plan to provide the benchmark for company financial metrics.

• Lead company, channel, and department target setting process both pre-season and in-season.

• Own enhancements to channel planning process to ensure optimized approach to maximizing strategies and results in both stores and ecomm.

• Help reconcile strategic plan to bottoms-up merchandise plan, align on gaps and course of action.

• Collaborate with Finance to ensure top down strategic plan aligns with EBITDA targets.

• Coordinate pursuit of targets across Merchandise Planning • Forecast and address sales and margin opportunities and risks.

• Foster cross-functional relationships across Merchandise Planning, Merchandising, Marketing, Finance, and Ecommerce.

• Facilitate Pre-MPC guidance and direction, including sharing recommendations / insights for course correction that are actionable and executable (pre-mpc direction).

• Provide direction for shifts in business (holidays, tax shifts, BTS shifts, promotional shifts).

• Recommend test scenarios for in depth understanding of price/promo effectiveness.

• Give promotional guidance at macro level to support company events and initiatives.

• Interact on a regular basis with the Leadership Team as a trusted advisor.

• Coach and mentor team members.

• Perform additional responsibilities as requested to achieve business objectives.

•        Great teammate. You know how to work with an influence those around you, and you don’t hesitate to roll up your sleeves and help when others need it.

•        Engaging interpersonal and presentation skills.

•        Coaching leadership style with the ability to inspire career growth and development.

•        Ability to operate independently while maintaining strong working relationships with co-workers and cross-functional teams.

•        Translation of strategy to influence business leaders.

•        Efficient organization, prioritization, and time management skills.

•        Coaching leadership style to inspire career growth and development.

•        Analytical and interpretation of data to parlay into compelling recommendations.

•        9+ years' experience in Planning and/or Allocation.

•        6+ years’ experience in leadership/managerial roles.

•        Prior retail experience preferred.

•        Masters Degree Preferred.

We are innovative and energetic. Inclusion is in our DNA and we recognize everyone's unique story they have to tell.

Some of our benefits include...

• Employee Discount
• Great Work Culture
• Casual Dress Code
• Generous PTO allowance
• Tiered medical, dental, vision, and life insurance benefits
• 401k retirement

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