This position is responsible for translating sales trends, promotions, seasonality, weather, market intelligence, and supply conditions into actionable forecasts and planning recommendations. By creating structure, visibility, and accountability across the planning process, the Planning Manager enables the Procurement team to devote greater focus to strategic sourcing and supplier partnerships while reducing overstocks, out-of-stocks, shrink, and unnecessary working capital.
Key Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:- Demand Planning & Forecasting
- Develop and maintain demand forecasts using historical sales, promotional activity, seasonality, weather, and relevant market intelligence.
- Translate forecasted demand into clear inventory and supply requirements, identifying risks, gaps, and changes that require Procurement and Sales action.
- Measure forecast accuracy and forecast bias, investigate material variances, and continuously improve planning assumptions and methodologies.
- Identify emerging sales trends, changes in customer demand, and potential supply constraints early enough to support proactive decision-making.
- Promotional Planning & Execution
- Coordinate promotional planning with Procurement and Sales, including pricing inputs, demand expectations, inventory builds, timing, and execution readiness.
- Ensure promotional demand is reflected in forecasts and supply plans with sufficient lead time for sourcing and operational execution.
- Conduct post-promotion analysis to assess forecast accuracy, sales performance, inventory impact, and opportunities to improve future events.
- New Item, First-of-Season & Holiday Planning
- Lead planning and execution for first-of-season items, holiday calendars, and new item launches.
- Coordinate cross-functional readiness and proactively surface risks that could affect launch timing, product availability, or customer service.
- Procurement Analytics & Inventory Performance
- Monitor inventory turns, days of supply, aging inventory, inventory capacity, service levels, and other inventory health indicators to improve productivity and freshness.
- Develop and provide executive KPI reporting on forecast accuracy, vendor performance, inventory, pricing, and commodity profitability.
- Identify opportunities to reduce overstocks, out-of-stocks, shrink, and working capital while supporting customer service expectations.
- Use data and exception-based analysis to prioritize issues and recommend actions to Procurement and cross-functional partners.
Qualifications & Requirements- 3-5 years of experience in procurement, demand planning, supply planning, inventory planning, or a related supply chain function preferred.
- Experience in produce, fresh food, food service, wholesale, or another highly perishable and fast-moving environment is strongly preferred.
- Demonstrated ability to develop forecasts, analyze inventory performance, identify exceptions, and convert data into actionable recommendations.
- Strong analytical skills with advanced proficiency in Microsoft Excel; experience with ERP, inventory, planning, or business intelligence systems is preferred.
- Strong understanding of seasonality, promotions, supply constraints, service levels, inventory turns, and other core planning concepts.
- Excellent communication and facilitation skills with the ability to align multiple departments around shared assumptions, decisions, and action plans.
- Highly organized and detail-oriented, with the ability to manage multiple priorities and deadlines in a fast-paced environment.
- Proactive problem solver who is comfortable working with incomplete or rapidly changing information and escalating risks when needed.
- Bachelor's degree in Supply Chain, Business, Finance, Analytics, Operations, or a related field preferred; equivalent relevant experience will be considered.
Work Environment & Schedule- Fast-paced, warehouse-adjacent office environment, supporting a perishable and logistics-intensive business.
- Proposed onboarding schedule includes six months of hybrid work, to include three days on-site across the Katzman facilities in New York and New Jersey and two days remote.
- Must be comfortable adapting to seasonal demand, changing market conditions, and time-sensitive planning needs.
Pay: $160,000 - $185,000 per year
