Purchasing Manager

Location: Jacksonville, Florida

Department: Supply Chain

Reports To: Vice President of Supply Chain

Direct Reports: Buyers

Position Summary

The Purchasing Manager is responsible for leading the purchasing function and managing a team of Buyers supporting the company's automotive parts distribution network. This role has direct responsibility for managing purchasing activity against established purchasing and inventory budgets while ensuring the organization maintains the appropriate inventory investment to support customer demand and service-level objectives.

A key focus of the position is optimizing inventory across the distribution network by balancing product availability with inventory productivity. The Purchasing Manager will proactively identify and manage excess and unproductive inventory, develop and execute inventory reduction strategies, and ensure purchasing decisions support the company's overall inventory and working capital objectives.

The Purchasing Manager will also provide leadership and direction to the buying team, establish purchasing priorities, monitor key performance indicators, evaluate supplier performance, and communicate supplier performance trends and concerns to the Category Management team. This role will partner closely with Category Management, Assortment Planning, Distribution Operations, and suppliers to improve inventory performance, product availability, and supply-chain execution.

Key Responsibilities
• Lead, coach, and develop a team of Buyers responsible for purchasing inventory across assigned suppliers and product categories.
• Own and manage purchasing activity against established purchasing budgets, ensuring purchases align with inventory plans, business needs, and financial objectives.
• Monitor purchasing spend and inventory investment, identify potential budget risks and opportunities, and provide regular reporting and forecasts to Supply Chain leadership.
• Develop purchasing strategies that balance product availability, customer service levels, inventory investment, and working capital objectives.
• Drive inventory optimization initiatives to improve inventory productivity while maintaining appropriate product availability across the distribution network.
• Monitor inventory performance and proactively identify excess, slow-moving, obsolete, and unproductive inventory.
• Develop and execute strategies to reduce excess and unproductive inventory, including purchasing adjustments, order reductions or cancellations, inventory redistribution, and coordination with Category Management on supplier return opportunities.
• Establish measurable inventory reduction targets and hold the purchasing team accountable for actions necessary to improve inventory productivity.
• Oversee daily purchasing activities to ensure inventory is ordered accurately and in alignment with established replenishment strategies, inventory targets, and service-level objectives.
• Review purchasing recommendations, inventory requirements, and supplier constraints to identify potential risks and opportunities before purchase orders are placed.
• Establish team priorities, workload expectations, and performance standards while ensuring consistent execution of purchasing processes.
• Monitor purchase orders from creation through receipt and proactively address shortages, delays, backorders, and other supply disruptions.
• Partner with Assortment Planning to support product availability, assortment changes, new product additions, inventory deployments, and location-specific inventory requirements.
• Monitor and analyze supplier performance, including fill rates, lead times, backorders, order accuracy, delivery performance, and other key service metrics.
• Identify supplier performance trends, recurring issues, and potential supply risks and communicate findings to the Category Management team.
• Develop and provide regular supplier performance reporting and actionable insights to Category Management and Supply Chain leadership to support supplier discussions and business decisions.
• Partner with Category Management to address supplier performance concerns and support corrective action plans when appropriate.
• Build and maintain strong supplier relationships and serve as an escalation point for significant purchasing and supply issues.
• Collaborate with suppliers and internal stakeholders to manage lead-time changes, product transitions, new product introductions, and other supply-chain initiatives.
• Develop, track, and report key purchasing and inventory performance metrics, including purchasing budget performance, inventory levels, inventory productivity, excess inventory, and supplier performance.
• Identify opportunities to improve purchasing processes, replenishment strategies, systems, reporting, and team productivity.
• Ensure Buyers maintain accurate purchasing parameters and follow established policies, procedures, and approval requirements.
• Partner with Distribution Operations to identify and resolve receiving, delivery, and other operational issues impacting inventory flow and product availability.
• Collaborate cross-functionally with Category Management, Assortment Planning, and Distribution Operations to resolve inventory and supply-related issues.
• Recruit, train, develop, and evaluate purchasing team members while fostering accountability, collaboration, and continuous improvement.

Qualifications
• Bachelor's degree in Supply Chain Management, Business, Operations, Finance, or a related field preferred.
• 10+ years of experience in purchasing, procurement, inventory management, supply chain, or a related function.
• Previous experience leading or directly managing a team strongly preferred.
• Experience managing purchasing budgets and inventory investment in a distribution environment preferred.
• Experience in wholesale distribution, automotive aftermarket, retail distribution, or another high-SKU environment preferred.
• Strong understanding of inventory management principles, including replenishment, inventory turns, excess inventory, service levels, lead times, and demand variability.
• Strong financial and analytical skills with the ability to manage budgets, analyze inventory performance, identify trends, and translate data into action.
• Advanced proficiency in Microsoft Excel and experience working with ERP, purchasing, or inventory management systems.
• Strong organizational skills with the ability to manage competing priorities in a fast-paced environment.
• Excellent communication, leadership, and relationship-management skills.

Success Measures

Success in this position will be measured through effective management of the purchasing budget, achievement of inventory investment targets, improved inventory productivity, reduction of excess and unproductive inventory, product availability and service levels, supplier performance, purchase order execution, and the performance and development of the purchasing team.

The Purchasing Manager will be expected to maintain an appropriate balance between inventory availability and financial performance, ensuring the company has the inventory necessary to support the business without creating unnecessary inventory investment or long-term excess.

Environmental/Occupational Health and Physical Requirements:

Typical 9-hour day to include walking, squatting, and lifting. To perform the duties of this job the employee must be capable of working in a fast-paced environment. Heavy lifting of 50lbs or more may be required.