Director of Merchandising

We are seeking an experienced, strategic, and customer-obsessed Director of Merchandising to lead our product strategy, assortment planning, and go-to-market execution. This role is crucial for driving profitable growth by delivering products that appeal to the customer and exceed financial goals. The ideal candidate possesses a strong track record in leading apparel merchandising teams, in driving successful strategies, having strong financial acumen, and accountable to key performance indicators (KPIs) and deadlines. The consumer is always at the heart of your process—prioritizing their insights, market data, trends, and buying habits. This is a highly cross-functional role requiring robust collaboration with Product Development, Finance, Design, Sales, and Marketing teams. You must be an excellent communicator and collaborator, capable of flexing from high-level strategic thinking to granular day-to-day execution. You are inspired and driven to establish the process and workflow for Merchandising, and build out a team over the next 2-3 years to support business growth, with no hesitation to fill in the gaps in the meantime. Responsibilities Develop and execute comprehensive apparel merchandising strategies that align with Criquet's business objectives to deliver profitable multi-channel growth. Establish and own the product assortment lineplan, ensuring a balanced and profitable mix that meets customer needs and supports sales goals for both DTC and wholesale channels. Analyze sales, inventory, consumer behavior, demand, and seasonal trends to ensure the assortment is highly productive, scalable, and desirable. Synthesize selling, historical performance, competitive research, customer feedback, channel differences and emerging opportunities and translate into product direction. Suppor t seasonal production forecasts for vendor partners, in partnership with Product Development. Monitor competitor activities and market trends to stay ahead in the industry. Cross-Functional Partnership & Execution Drive product conversations with concrete data and the current state of the business to help identify sales opportunities in both the short term and long term. Collaborate closely with the Design and Product Development teams through end-to-end seasonal development and lineplanning, ensuring alignment with the launch calendar, proper prioritization of initiatives, and that product meets quality, fit, and financial objectives. Partner with the Design, Development, Sales, and Marketing on new product innovation, brand collaborations/partnerships, and creative vision. Collaborate with the Finance, Sales, and Merch Ops team on in-season forecasts, future season assortment buys, and inventory management to develop and drive a highly productive assortment, margin, and well-planned cash flow. Develop and maintain strong relationships with factories and vendors. Apply learnings and feedback from Customer Experience and Sales team to continuously improve quality, availability, and assortment. Evolve and clarify internal merchandising processes and tools to scale with the business and reduce redundancy. Business & Team Leadership Present weekly and monthly business results to Leadership, providing ongoing guidance on product performance, successes, and challenges. Organize and format large amounts of data into digestible reports for cross-functional stakeholders, telling the story behind the numbers. Build out, lead, and mentor a merchandising team in a hybrid environment. Requirements 10+ years progressive experience in apparel merchandising/buying/planning at SKU-intensive and omni-channel brands. Proven experience building out and leading a team. Proven experience creating assortment plans and successfully bringing new products to market at a DTC-native brand, with growth in wholesale channel. Previous omni-channel experience and deep understanding of how regional merchandising, wholesale, retail and digital assortments may all interact. Strong interest in current menswear trends, as well as macro/lifestyle trends. Demonstrated ability to translate the larger brand strategy and vision into a cohesive product architecture. Deep understanding of consumer shopping patterns, outfitting, and end use. Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills, ability to deal with ambiguity, and resilience to take on unexpected twists and turns of a growing brand. Strong financial acumen and ability to manage KPIs, Open-to-Buy, and inventory. Exceptional verbal and written communication ability; adept at presenting information to different audiences and storytelling with data. Advanced proficiency in Excel and presentation software (such as PowerPoint or Figma), as well as proficiency in Google Workspace. Proficiency and curiosity in AI, and how it can responsibly assist in the merchandising process, without sacrificing business fundamentals or product knowledge, while maintaining company confidentiality. Ability to travel as required, 2-4x/year domestic and 1-2x/year international. #J-18808-Ljbffr Criquet Shirts