Junior Category Manager

About the role

You will own a set of categories end to end, working alongside our Category Manager. Twelve months in, you should be running your own assortment and buying plan, holding your own in vendor negotiations, and be the person the retail and e-commerce teams come to for anything about your products. This is a stepping-stone role into full category ownership — we want someone who wants that.

What you’ll do

• Assortment: Own the product range for your categories — what we list, what we drop, what we bring in next. Track what competitors are ranging and priced at.
• Buying: Raise and follow through on purchase orders, manage min–max levels and stock cover, and work with vendors on pricing, rebates, protection and promotional support.
• Pricing and margin: Set and maintain retail pricing across store and online channels, protect category margin, and manage markdowns and ageing stock before they become a problem.
• Vendor relationships: Be the day-to-day contact for your brands — forecasts, launches, allocations, marketing support and issue resolution.
• New product launches: Coordinate launch readiness across buying, retail operations, e-commerce and marketing so products land in stores and online on time and correctly listed.
• Analysis and reporting: Track sell-through, stock cover, margin and category performance in Excel, and bring a clear point of view on what to do about it.

What we’re looking for

Required

• 2–5 years of experience in category management, buying, merchandising, or a closely related commercial role
• Solid commercial judgement — you can look at sell-through and margin numbers and say what should change
• Good working knowledge of Microsoft Office, with strong Excel skills — pivot tables, lookups, and comfort building and maintaining category reports
• Confident dealing directly with vendors and negotiating
• Organized enough to run multiple brands, launches and POs at once without dropping details
• Good written and spoken English

Preferred

• Consumer electronics experience — mobiles, computing, audio, gaming or accessories
• Hands-on buying or purchase-order ownership
• Experience managing a category on online marketplaces (Amazon, Noon) as well as in physical retail
• Familiarity with an ERP or retail inventory system
• UAE or wider GCC market experience

Application Question(s):

• Do you have experience working with consumer electronics products, such as mobiles, computing, audio, gaming, or accessories?

Experience:

• Category management: 2 years (Required)

Work Location: In person