The Commercial Footwear Merchandising Manager supports the growth and execution of the SureWerx footwear portfolio across wholesale, distribution, retail, and e-commerce channels.

This role works closely with Footwear Product, Sales, Marketing, and Operations to build customer assortments, support new product launches, manage sales and merchandising tools, coordinate channel marketing activities, and improve the productivity of the footwear portfolio.

This role will serve as a key day-to-day resource for the Sales team and our retail and distribution partners, helping ensure our footwear products are effectively presented, launched, and supported in the marketplace.

This is a remote position, however some travel will be required for customer meetings, trade shows, sales meetings, market visits.

Key Responsibilities

Footwear Merchandising

• Build and maintain footwear assortments by customer, channel, category, and price point, supporting customer line reviews and new product recommendations
• Analyze performance by brand, style, SKU, customer, and channel to identify assortment gaps, growth opportunities, and underperforming products
• Monitor competitive footwear products, pricing, features, and assortments and maintain relevant competitive comparisons
• Partner with Footwear Product Management on product positioning, pricing, assortment planning, and product lifecycle recommendations
• Provide Sales and customer feedback to Product Management to help identify future product and category opportunities

Sales Enablement

• Serve as a day-to-day footwear product and merchandising resource for the Sales organization
• Create customer presentations, assortment recommendations, line reviews, product guides, competitive comparisons, and selling materials
• Support Sales with product, pricing, assortment, competitive, and customer-specific requests
• Coordinate footwear samples and support product training, customer meetings, trade shows, and sales meetings as needed

New Product Introduction & Commercialization

• Coordinate commercial activities for new footwear launches and maintain the footwear launch calendar and key milestones
• Partner with Product, Sales, Marketing, and Operations to ensure products, pricing, samples, imagery, sales tools, and marketing assets are ready for launch
• Develop and distribute launch materials and support customer-specific product introductions
• Track new product adoption and provide follow-up support to Sales and customers following launch

Channel Marketing

• Coordinate the monthly footwear social media strategy and content calendar in partnership with Brand Marketing
• Coordinate retailer and distributor marketing needs, including customer-specific programs, promotions, product launches, imagery, copy, and digital assets
• Manage footwear POP, GWP, retail displays, and fixture needs, coordinating execution with Sales, customers, vendors, and internal teams
• Manage and maintain footwear catalogs, line sheets, product guides, and other customer-facing materials
• Manage the footwear media library, ensuring current product photography, lifestyle imagery, logos, videos, and approved marketing assets are organized and accessible

Portfolio Management & Reporting

• Track footwear sales, margin, inventory, and product performance by brand, style, SKU, customer, and channel
• Monitor new product adoption, slow-moving products, and assortment productivity and recommend actions as needed
• Support SKU rationalization, product lifecycle, and assortment optimization activities
• Maintain key footwear merchandising, product, competitive, and channel reporting

Core Capabilities

• Strong understanding of footwear merchandising, product assortments, and retail/wholesale environments
• Strong analytical skills with the ability to turn sales and product data into actionable recommendations
• Strong project management, organization, and attention to detail across multiple brands and priorities
• Strong customer presentation, communication, and product storytelling skills
• Ability to work effectively across Product, Sales, Marketing, Operations, and external customer teams

Key Requirements

Experience & Technical Capability

5-7 years of experience in one or more of the following:

• Footwear merchandising, product/category management, retail buying, or wholesale merchandising
• Commercial merchandising, channel marketing, customer marketing, or retail marketing
• Developing customer assortments, line reviews, product presentations, and sales tools
• Supporting new product launches, commercialization, and customer activation programs
• Managing retail marketing programs including POP, fixtures, GWP, catalogs, digital assets, or related programs

Experience in the footwear industry is strongly preferred, with work, safety, occupational, athletic, outdoor, or performance footwear experience considered an asset.

Experience working across wholesale, distribution, retail, and/or e-commerce channels preferred.

Advanced proficiency in Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint. Experience with Power BI, ERP, PLM, DAM, or similar systems is an asset.

Education

Bachelor's degree in Merchandising, Marketing, Business, Retail Management, or a related field. Equivalent relevant professional experience may also be considered.