Assortment Planning Assistant / Specialist

About the Company and Role

We are an internationally-oriented organization dedicated to enhancing product assortments, inventory efficiency, customer options, and overall commercial success across various markets and sales platforms. Our interdisciplinary teams collaborate closely with divisions such as Merchandising, Buying, Planning, Sales, Marketing, E-Commerce, Supply Chain, Finance, and Operations, as well as suppliers, to ensure the right products, quantities, pricing, and timing meet customer demands and business targets.

The role involves supporting the development, analysis, deployment, and ongoing optimization of product assortments spanning multiple categories, markets, store formats, regions, and digital channels. This position is fully remote based in the United Arab Emirates and suitable for mid to senior-level professionals.

Key Responsibilities

• Assist in creating assortment planning strategies aligned with sales goals, margins, inventory requirements, customer preferences, and business priorities.
• Analyze historical data on sales, inventory, product performance, customer trends, and market developments.
• Contribute to the formulation of seasonal, annual, promotional, and channel-specific assortment plans.
• Review product performance by SKU, category, brand, channel, location, customer segment, and sales period to identify product status such as high-performing, underperforming, new, declining, or discontinued items.
• Participate in SKU rationalization and assortment optimization efforts.
• Evaluate assortment breadth, depth, productivity, and product mix characteristics including price points, attributes, sizes, colors, styles, and variants.
• Support assortment decisions across stores, regions, markets, and e-commerce platforms.
• Analyze customer purchasing preferences to identify assortment opportunities.
• Assist in planning lifecycle management for new product introductions and phase-outs.
• Coordinate assortment needs for product launches, seasonal collections, marketing campaigns, and promotional periods.
• Monitor product availability and detect potential assortment gaps or risks such as stockouts, excess inventory, or slow-moving products.
• Collaborate with Inventory Planning and Supply Chain teams to ensure alignment of assortments with inventory availability and replenishment capabilities.
• Work closely with Merchandising and Buying teams on product selection, assortment architecture, and changes.
• Support category reviews with data-driven assortment recommendations and conduct performance analyses after assortment adjustments, including post-season and post-launch evaluations.
• Monitor actual versus planned sales, margins, inventory, and SKU productivity.
• Provide demand analysis for different markets, channels, customer segments, and locations, supporting store clustering and localized assortments where relevant.
• Maintain assortment documentation such as planning files, product lists, SKU hierarchies, planning calendars, and product attribute data ensuring accuracy and consistency across systems.
• Coordinate product master data updates and generate assortment-related reports, dashboards, and management presentations.
• Conduct competitor and market analysis to identify assortment opportunities and gaps, benchmarking ranges, category structures, and market positioning.
• Perform scenario analyses for assortment changes, new products, store openings, channel expansion, and seasonal events, evaluating financial and inventory impacts.
• Support open-to-buy and inventory planning activities influenced by assortment choices.
• Engage with Procurement and Supplier Management on product availability, lead times, minimum order quantities, and constraints impacting assortments.
• Communicate with allocation and replenishment teams about assortment priorities and support markdown, clearance, and exit strategies for discontinued or underperforming products.
• Participate in assortment review meetings and foster continuous improvements in planning processes, data quality, tools, and reporting efficiency.
• Maintain confidentiality of all commercial, pricing, supplier, customer, and product information.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

• Sales and margin outcomes for assortments
• Sales per SKU and SKU productivity
• Inventory turnover and stock availability metrics, including stockout, excess inventory, and slow-moving product rates
• Assortment productivity including breadth and depth metrics
• New product performance and sell-through rates
• Lifecycle and SKU rationalization effectiveness
• Accuracy and alignment of forecasts, sales, inventory, margin, and product data
• Effectiveness of seasonal, promotional, channel, localized, and store-level assortments
• Customer demand alignment and product availability
• Performance of markdown, clearance, product phase-in/out strategies
• Working capital efficiency and inventory productivity
• Completion and quality of assortment reviews and reporting
• Efficiency of planning processes and stakeholder satisfaction
• Benefits from continuous improvement initiatives

Ideal Candidate Profile

• Proven experience in assortment planning, merchandise or category planning, retail or inventory planning, commercial analysis, or related product planning environments, preferably within sectors like retail, e-commerce, consumer goods, fashion, or distribution.
• Strong understanding of assortment principles, merchandise planning, and product lifecycle management including new product launches and phase-out strategies.
• Skilled in analyzing sales, inventory, margins, product, and customer datasets and evaluating performance at SKU, category, channel, and market levels.
• Proficient with Microsoft Excel and familiar with ERP, merchandise planning, inventory planning, business intelligence, or retail systems.
• Experience handling large product datasets and identifying trends, risks, and commercial opportunities.
• Good knowledge of inventory, replenishment, allocation, and supply chain interdependencies.
• Effective collaboration skills across multiple business functions including Merchandising, Buying, Supply Chain, Finance, Sales, Marketing, and Operations.
• Detail-oriented with strong organizational capabilities to manage multiple deadlines and priorities.
• Excellent communication and presentation skills, able to convert analytical insights into actionable business recommendations.
• Experience with e-commerce or omnichannel assortment planning is a plus.
• Additional skills in statistical analysis, forecasting, dashboard creation, or data visualization would be advantageous.
• A commercially minded, analytical, proactive individual with a commitment to continuous process improvement.