Director, North America Retail Operations for a Leading Premium Activewear and Wellness Lifestyle Brand

Our client is an established and well-known brand specializing in high-quality, responsibly sourced and manufactured athletic apparel that functions as both gym and streetwear. They have a thriving e-commerce business as well as popular brick-and-mortar retail stores. With a rapidly expanding global retail footprint of 200+ stores and ambitious international growth plans, the company is scaling its leadership infrastructure to match its trajectory. They are seeking a Director of North America Retail Operations to drive operational excellence across the region while playing a key role in shaping the company’s global retail operating model. This is a dual-mandate role—equal parts execution leader and strategic contributor—ideal for a high-horsepower operator who has seen retail businesses scale and knows how to build the systems and processes that make growth sustainable.

This is primarily an in-person role, reporting to our client’s offices Los Angeles.

Responsibilities:
- Work closely with Global Retail Operations to co-develop and continuously evolve the company’s retail operating model, processes, and systems—serving as a key thought partner on operational efficiency and scalability
- Lead the planning and execution of new initiative rollouts and process changes across North America, ensuring they are fully operationalized and scalable before broader deployment
- Use North America as a test-and-learn environment, monitoring adoption and execution quality and providing structured feedback to inform global frameworks
- Drive daily operational excellence across all North American locations, ensuring consistency with company standards while identifying and implementing process improvements that simplify execution and boost store performance
- Build deep, hands-on expertise in store operations through regular field engagement—including time spent working directly alongside store teams
- Partner cross-functionally with Logistics, Loss Prevention, Planning, Merchandising, Technology, and field leadership to align on business objectives and drive operational outcomes
- Own operational readiness for new store openings across North America, ensuring all processes, systems, and logistics are in place prior to launch
- Monitor and drive performance against key operational KPIs—including inventory accuracy, shrink, replenishment and recovery rates, and omnichannel fulfillment—identifying root causes of issues and implementing scalable solutions
- Collaborate with the Workforce Management team to ensure alignment between labor models and the broader operating model
- Lead, coach, and develop a high-performing team, setting clear priorities and fostering a culture of operational expertise, accountability, and empowerment

Qualifications:
- Bachelor’s degree, preferred
- 10+ years of experience in retail operations, with a focus on multi-region or national execution at scale
- Deep expertise in store operations, process design, and operational scalability—with a proven ability to both build and execute operational strategies in fast-paced retail environments
- Experience at a high-volume, high-growth retailer; candidates from low-volume or highly structured mature retailers may find the environment challenging—ideal background includes having seen meaningful growth phases across multiple organizations
- Experience piloting, testing, and scaling new initiatives or operating models across a large retail fleet
- Strong cross-functional leadership and influencing skills, with the ability to partner effectively with field teams, district managers, and senior stakeholders
- Solid project management capabilities with experience managing complex, multi-workstream initiatives and timelines
- Comfortable being hands-on in the field—this role requires regular store visits and direct engagement with store and field teams
- Must be based in or willing to relocate to the greater Los Angeles area; willingness to travel across North America as needed (approximately one week per month)

Compensation : Targeting a base salary of $165,000–$185,000