Buyer

Manchester | Office-based 

Competitive salary

Are you a commercially minded Buyer with a passion for product development, range building and spotting emerging trends?

We’re looking for an established Buyer with around 2–3 years’ experience to join a fast-paced buying team, where you’ll take ownership of product development and range performance from initial concept through to launch.

This is an excellent opportunity for someone who combines strong commercial awareness with a great eye for product, confident supplier negotiation skills and the ability to deliver results in a deadline-driven environment.

The Role

As Buyer, you’ll take ownership of your product category, developing commercially strong ranges that meet customer expectations, deliver value and drive sales and margin performance. Working closely with the wider buying team and colleagues across the business, you’ll play a key role in bringing new products to market and ensuring ranges remain competitive, relevant and commercially successful.

Key Responsibilities

Range Building & Product Development

• Build commercially focused ranges, balancing core products, seasonal opportunities and newness.
• Manage the product development process from initial concept through to launch, working closely with Design and the Senior Buyer.
• Oversee the sample approval process, ensuring products meet agreed quality and specification standards before bulk production.
• Identify emerging trends, colours and designs, translating these into relevant and commercially viable product opportunities.
• Maintain a strong focus on product quality, customer expectations and value.

Commercial Performance & Trading

• Deliver agreed sales, intake margin and achieved margin targets.
• Negotiate cost prices, payment terms, minimum order quantities and lead times with suppliers.
• Analyse sales performance at category, option and SKU level, identifying bestsellers, underperforming products and opportunities to improve performance.
• Make recommendations around repeats, range extensions, promotions and product exits.
• Support promotional and markdown planning, balancing sales volumes with profitability.
• Prepare and present range reviews, trading updates and post-season analysis.

Supplier Management & Critical Path

• Manage the category critical path, tracking key milestones from initial brief through to launch and escalating potential delays.
• Work with overseas factories and agents to ensure production meets agreed schedules and quality standards.
• Build strong supplier relationships while identifying opportunities to develop existing partnerships and explore new sourcing options.
• Collaborate with Supply Chain to manage shipping, lead times and intake, resolving issues as they arise.

Market Awareness & Multichannel Trading

• Develop a strong understanding of the target customer, competitors and the wider value market.
• Conduct competitor analysis, including pricing, range comparisons and SWOT reviews.
• Work with Ecommerce to ensure products are accurately set up and presented effectively online, including imagery, content and onsite visibility.
• Support marketplace and social commerce channels, ensuring products are appropriately ranged for each platform.
• Brief and supply products for photography, marketing campaigns and influencer activity.

About You

You’ll be an established Buyer who enjoys working at pace, takes ownership of their category and understands how to balance product, customer and commercial performance.

You’ll ideally bring:

• Around 2–3 years’ buying experience within a fast-paced online or multichannel retail environment.
• Experience buying within a large product category, with exposure to product development and range building.
• Strong critical path management skills and the ability to deliver ranges to deadline.
• Experience negotiating directly with suppliers on pricing, terms and lead times.
• Knowledge of the sample approval process through to bulk production.
• Strong commercial awareness, with confidence analysing sales, margin and product performance data.
• Excellent organisation, accuracy and attention to detail.
• Clear written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to present ranges and recommendations.
• Good IT skills, particularly Excel.

Experience of overseas sourcing, factory visits or developing a product category from scratch would also be advantageous.

The Ideal Candidate

You’ll be commercially driven, product passionate and proactive in identifying opportunities to improve performance. You’ll take ownership of the detail, stay on top of deadlines and work collaboratively with colleagues across Buying, Design, Merchandising, Ecommerce and Supply Chain.

You’ll also be adaptable, comfortable working in a fast-moving environment and confident making decisions based on customer needs, market trends and commercial results.

Please note due to high volumes of applications unfortunately we are not always able to respond to all unsuccessful applicants. However we wish everyone who applies the very best with their job search.

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