Purchasing Manager

Job Description

Job Description

Purchasing Manager – Manufacturing 

Position Summary

We are an established RV manufacturer seeking an experienced Purchasing Manager to lead our purchasing and procurement activities.

The ideal candidate will have a strong background in purchasing within a manufacturing environment and experience managing a large and complex supplier and parts base. Experience in the RV industry is welcome but not required . We are more interested in someone who understands manufacturing, material requirements, inventory control, supplier performance, and how to keep a production operation supplied without creating excessive inventory.

Candidates should have experience managing the procurement of a large number of parts and materials—ideally 10,000+ active parts/SKUs—or comparable purchasing complexity within a manufacturing organization.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the company's purchasing and procurement activities to ensure materials and components are available to support production.
• Manage and develop the Purchasing team, establishing clear responsibilities, priorities, and performance expectations.
• Manage purchasing across a large and diverse parts and supplier base.
• Work closely with Production, Warehouse, Inventory, Engineering, Quality, Sales, and Accounting to ensure material requirements are understood and met.
• Monitor material requirements, lead times, inventory levels, and supplier performance to prevent production shortages.
• Develop purchasing strategies that balance cost, availability, lead time, quality, and inventory levels .
• Negotiate pricing, payment terms, lead times, minimum order quantities, freight, volume discounts, and supplier agreements.
• Identify and develop alternate and secondary suppliers to reduce supply-chain risk.
• Review purchasing requirements and ensure purchase orders are placed accurately and on time.
• Proactively identify potential shortages and resolve them before they impact production .
• Hold suppliers accountable for quality, delivery performance, pricing, and commitments.
• Work with Engineering and Quality to resolve supplier-related quality and component issues.
• Support new product introductions, engineering changes, and model-year changes by ensuring new components are sourced and available when required.
• Identify opportunities for cost reduction, supplier consolidation, inventory reduction, and process improvement .
• Improve purchasing systems, reporting, forecasting, and ERP utilization.
• Establish and monitor purchasing KPIs, including supplier on-time delivery, shortages, purchase price variance, inventory levels, lead times, and cost savings.

Required Qualifications

• Minimum of 10 years of purchasing, procurement, supply-chain, or materials management experience.
• Significant purchasing experience within a manufacturing environment .
• Experience managing a large and complex number of purchased parts, materials, and suppliers.
• Experience managing the procurement of 10,000+ parts/SKUs or a similarly complex manufacturing purchasing environment is strongly preferred .
• Demonstrated experience managing and developing purchasing personnel.
• Strong supplier negotiation and vendor-management experience.
• Proven ability to prevent material shortages while controlling inventory.
• Strong understanding of manufacturing purchasing, inventory management, lead times, forecasting, and material planning.
• Experience negotiating pricing, MOQs, payment terms, freight, lead times, and long-term supplier agreements.
• Strong analytical, organizational, communication, leadership, and problem-solving skills.
• Proficiency with ERP/MRP systems, purchasing systems, and Microsoft Excel.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience purchasing components and raw materials for a high-mix manufacturing operation.
• Experience with fabricated components, electrical components, plumbing, appliances, hardware, metals, wood products, composites, plastics, or similar manufacturing materials.
• Experience improving supplier performance and developing supplier scorecards/KPIs.
• Demonstrated success reducing material costs and inventory while improving parts availability.
• Experience supporting engineering changes and new product introductions.
• RV, automotive, marine, aerospace, heavy equipment, or other complex assembly manufacturing experience is a plus.

Ideal Candidate

The ideal candidate is a hands-on manufacturing Purchasing Manager who understands that purchasing is about more than issuing purchase orders.

We are looking for someone who can manage a complex supply base, anticipate material requirements, prevent shortages, negotiate aggressively but professionally, control inventory, develop suppliers, and continuously look for opportunities to reduce costs.

Because we manufacture RVs with thousands of individual components, the successful candidate must be comfortable operating in an environment where one missing part can affect an entire production line .

RV experience is not required. We are looking for someone with a strong manufacturing background who can bring proven purchasing practices, leadership, and supply-chain discipline to our operation.

Experience Requirement

A minimum of 10 years of relevant purchasing, procurement, supply-chain, or materials management experience is required.

Manufacturing purchasing experience is strongly preferred, particularly experience managing 10,000+ parts/SKUs or a similarly complex purchasing operation.