Ecommerce Product & Catalog Manager

ABOUT NORTH COUNTRY FIRE

North Country Fire is a privately held, owner-led national ecommerce company specializing in technically detailed fireplace and hearth products. Our customers are often making a substantial purchase that must be selected, configured, documented, and installed correctly. A product page may need to explain model differences, fuel type, ignition, venting, framing dimensions, technical specifications, required components, compatible accessories, configuration restrictions, installation documentation, warranty coverage, pricing, availability, and the exact products that must reach the cart.

We are hiring an Ecommerce Product & Catalog Manager to own the accuracy, completeness, structure, usability, and commercial effectiveness of that product experience—from original manufacturer information through the live Shopify product page and final cart configuration.

THE ROLE

This is a hands-on product-information and ecommerce ownership role for someone who can learn complex products, determine what is true, organize accurate information, and make the customer’s path to a correct purchase clear. The focus is product accuracy, customer understanding, and dependable execution.

The Product & Catalog Manager works directly with manufacturer pricebooks, product pages, catalogs, manuals, specification sheets, technical drawings, compatibility tables, images, videos, warranty documents, spreadsheets, PDFs, Shopify records, product data, and customer-facing pages. The person must be comfortable finding contradictions, determining which source is authoritative for each fact, resolving incomplete product structures, and verifying the live result personally.

The role begins with intensive in-person training and guided work on real products, manufacturer documents, Shopify records, product pages, configuration rules, customer questions, and current product-data systems. Fireplace knowledge, Shopify operation, catalog terminology, and internal tools can be learned during onboarding. Evidence discipline, technical learning ability, structured thinking, and personal ownership are required at hire.

HOW WE WORK

Our internal CRM, source-management tools, and AI-assisted workflows help collect and find manufacturer information, organize review work, investigate discrepancies, and document follow-through. The Product & Catalog Manager uses these tools to establish the correct business outcome, resolve uncertainty, and verify results. Tool output and collected documents still require critical review for accuracy, authority, and applicability.

You make supported changes within your training and authority, and work with engineering or AI development agents when software or integration changes are needed. Engineering owns technical implementation. You define the required product behavior, provide evidence and acceptance criteria, and retain responsibility for checking the completed customer experience. Some workflows require coordinated implementation; a generated proposal or completed review does not mean the live catalog has been corrected.

WHAT YOU WILL OWN

• Own the product-data lifecycle from authoritative manufacturer source through Shopify product, variant, metafield, media, collection, search, product-page, and cart representation.

• Review and interpret manufacturer pricebooks, catalogs, product pages, manuals, specification sheets, technical drawings, warranty documents, spreadsheets, PDFs, images, and related source material.

• Determine which source is authoritative for each product fact, confirm its model, fuel, revision, and date applicability, and retain clear evidence and correction records. Investigate conflicts, seek precise manufacturer or specialist clarification when needed, and track unresolved questions through resolution.

• Establish and maintain accurate relationships among manufacturers, series, product families, models, manufacturer SKUs, Shopify products, sellable variants, accessories, required components, bundles, replacements, supersessions, and discontinued products.

• Verify exact manufacturer item identity across Shopify sellable variants, distributor identifiers, and legacy records. Use manufacturer SKUs for true sellable items and maintain controlled mappings for differing identifiers, bundles, and presentation-only selections.

• Own the accuracy and usefulness of customer-facing product pages, including descriptions, specifications, dimensions, fuel and ignition information, venting, manuals, drawings, warranties, images, and video. Make supported content edits and define requirements for template, structured-data, or other engineering changes.

• Maintain clear product categories, collections, filters, attributes, naming conventions, and consistent presentation using established catalog structures. Work with engineering and marketing on changes to underlying fields, search behavior, or technical SEO.

• Define and validate configurable-product and guided-selling rules, including required and optional choices, conditional steps, compatibility restrictions, conversion kits, companion products, bundles, quantities, informational selections, and resulting cart items. Engineering implements changes that require code or integrations.

• Verify that shopper-facing options resolve to the correct sellable products and quantities and that displayed pricing agrees with the actual cart.

• Audit live Shopify products and variants against manufacturer source information; identify incorrect prices, missing products, bad mappings, incomplete pages, conflicting specifications, obsolete information, weak media, and customer-facing ambiguity.

• Manage new-product introduction, manufacturer updates, price changes, model revisions, discontinuations, source conflicts, corrections, and product-family modernization through a controlled and reviewable process.

• Test product pages and configurators on desktop and mobile, including selection behavior, conditional logic, displayed information, pricing, cart contents, documentation, and customer decision flow.

• Use sales questions, support cases, search behavior, returns, cancellations, customer feedback, and commercial results to identify where product information or configuration is failing.

• Prioritize product-family work by customer risk, revenue opportunity, conversion impact, catalog exposure, operational burden, and available source evidence.

• Define business requirements, edge cases, acceptance criteria, test cases, and expected results for engineering or automation work affecting the catalog. Coding is not required, but the Product & Catalog Manager must be able to test technical output critically and explain the required business behavior precisely.

• Use AI-assisted research, comparison, drafting, and issue investigation as part of the workflow. Independently verify material product claims against applicable sources, identify unsupported conclusions, and check the resulting customer experience.

• Follow, maintain, and improve existing product-data standards, QA checks, review requirements, ownership rules, and documentation. Identify recurring problems and propose practical improvements with engineering and operations.

WHAT SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE

• Material product facts can be traced to an appropriate authoritative source.

• Manufacturer SKUs, Shopify variants, accessories, bundles, mappings, product pages, and cart payloads agree with one another.

• Customers can understand, compare, configure, and purchase complex products without avoidable uncertainty.

• Required components are not omitted, incompatible selections are not presented as valid, and presentation-only choices do not become incorrect cart items.

• Product pages consistently contain useful specifications, dimensions, documentation, media, warranties, installation context, and configuration guidance.

• New products and manufacturer updates move through a repeatable process rather than one-off manual construction.

• Catalog defects are identified before they create incorrect orders, customer-service escalations, cancellations, returns, chargebacks, or manufacturer disputes.

• Sales and support teams spend less time correcting missing, conflicting, or poorly organized product information.

• Product-page conversion, configuration completion, accessory attachment, catalog completeness, and product-data reliability improve over time.

• Work is carried through live verification. A completed spreadsheet, submitted request, generated proposal, or published change is not treated as success until the storefront and cart behavior are confirmed.

REQUIRED ABILITIES

• Strong analytical judgment and the ability to learn technically detailed products, read source documents carefully, and explain what the evidence establishes and what remains uncertain.

• Exceptional attention to detail, including a habit of finding contradictions, missing information, incorrect identifiers, and unsupported assumptions.

• Practical spreadsheet and data literacy: accurately compare identifiers, prices, quantities, and product attributes; sort and filter records; and recognize mismatches. Advanced spreadsheet expertise is not required.

• Logical reasoning about product choices and dependencies, with the ability to learn how required parts, optional accessories, incompatible selections, and quantities affect a complete purchase.

• Clear written communication: explain a problem precisely, document evidence and expected results, and produce or review understandable customer-facing content.

• Personal ownership of investigations and corrections, including appropriate escalation, coordination with teammates, and verification that the completed result meets the requirement.

• Comfort learning business software and using AI-assisted tools, with a willingness to question output and verify material facts independently.

• Ability to prioritize work, follow and improve established quality checks, and collaborate directly with the CEO and remote engineering, sales, support, operations, and marketing teammates.

PREFERRED EXPERIENCE

These experiences can shorten onboarding, but they are not prerequisites. We evaluate demonstrated ability and relevant work examples without a minimum-years requirement.

• Hands-on work in ecommerce, catalog operations, product information, purchasing, estimating, parts operations, technical support, technical documentation, or another role where detailed information affects real customer or operational outcomes.

• Experience with Shopify products, variants, collections, metafields, media, imports or exports, and product-page QA, or comparable work in another ecommerce platform.

• Experience with fireplaces, HVAC equipment, appliances, building materials, automotive parts, industrial equipment, electrical products, plumbing products, or another technically complex category.

• Experience with product information systems, configurators, compatibility rules, bundles, or parts relationships. Familiarity with PIM, MDM, or CPQ platforms is useful but optional.

• Experience with product categories, filters, search discoverability, SEO, product feeds, or structured content.

• Experience improving data quality, spreadsheet comparisons, documentation, QA checklists, or repeatable review processes.

TRAINING AND TECHNICAL EXPECTATIONS

Training covers fireplace products and source documents; Shopify operation; product families, models, SKUs, sellable variants, bundles, and presentation-only selections; configuration and compatibility rules; internal CRM and AI-assisted tools; and storefront and cart verification. The expectation is reliable working competence after guided training.

Coding, APIs, JSON, Liquid, HTML, JavaScript, SQL, and prior people-management experience are not required. You must be able to explain the intended business behavior, recognize incorrect results, and work effectively with those implementing technical changes.

A college degree is not required. Demonstrated judgment, ownership, technical aptitude, and quality of work matter more than credentials, job title, or a fixed number of years in ecommerce.

WORK ARRANGEMENT

This is a full-time, on-site position in North Conway, New Hampshire, with direct collaboration with the CEO and remote teammates.

RELEVANT BACKGROUNDS

Strong candidates may come from technical support, purchasing, estimating, parts operations, technical documentation, ecommerce, catalog operations, product configuration, industrial distribution, HVAC, building products, appliances, or other detail-sensitive work. Candidates with transferable reasoning, accuracy, and follow-through are encouraged to apply even without prior Shopify or catalog-manager experience.

THIS ROLE IS UNLIKELY TO FIT SOMEONE WHO

• Wants a software-roadmap, campaign-management, brand-marketing, or delegation-centered product role.

• Primarily coordinates product entry performed by others but does not personally inspect source material, product records, and live pages.

• Treats polished copy, visual merchandising, or listing volume as a substitute for product correctness.

• Relies on manufacturer marketing copy, current Shopify data, AI output, or an employee explanation without determining which evidence controls.

• Is uncomfortable working with technical documents, spreadsheets, product identifiers, mappings, and configuration rules.

• Passes an unresolved product problem to others without investigating available evidence, stating the remaining question clearly, or following through on the answer and correction. Seeking manufacturer or specialist clarification is expected when the evidence is insufficient.

• Considers publication complete without testing the live product page, configuration behavior, pricing, and cart result.

COMPENSATION AND BENEFITS

The anticipated base salary range is $55,000–$85,000, depending on relevant experience and demonstrated ability to learn complex products, maintain accurate information, and carry work through verification. North Country Fire currently provides 100% medical, dental, and vision coverage. Eligibility dates and plan details are provided in formal offer materials.

Pay: $55,000.00 - $85,000.00 per year

Benefits:

• 401(k)
• Dental insurance
• Employee discount
• Health insurance
• Paid time off
• Professional development assistance
• Retirement plan
• Vision insurance

Application Question(s):

• Describe the most complex ecommerce product catalog you have personally owned. What made it complex, and which parts did you directly manage?
• What hands-on experience do you have with Shopify products, variants, metafields, collections, imports or exports, and product-page QA?
• A manufacturer pricebook, installation manual, manufacturer product page, and current Shopify page contain conflicting information. Explain how you would determine what belongs on the product page.
• Give one example of a product-data, compatibility, configuration, or PDP problem you discovered that others had missed. What evidence did you use, what did you change, and how did you verify the result?
• Describe a configurable or compatibility-dependent product you have worked with. How were required components, optional accessories, incompatible choices, bundles, and cart behavior represented?
• Are you comfortable working full-time on-site in North Conway, New Hampshire? State any commute or relocation considerations.
• Does the stated $55,000–$85,000 base-salary range align with your expectations?

Work Location: In person