About Mars, Incorporated

Mars is a family-owned business with more than a century of history making diverse products and offering services for people and the pets people love. With almost $45 billion in sales, the company is a global business that produces some of the world’s best-loved brands: PEDIGREE®, WHISKAS®, M&M’s®, SNICKERS®, TWIX®, MILKY WAY®, DOVE®, ROYAL CANIN®, EXTRA®, ORBIT®, 5™, SKITTLES®, BEN’S ORIGINAL® and MARS DRINKS and COCOAVIA®. Mars also provides veterinary health services that include BANFIELD® Pet Hospitals, Blue Pearl®, VCA® and Pet Partners™. Headquartered in McLean, VA, Mars operates in more than 80 countries. The Mars Five Principles – Quality, Responsibility, Mutuality, Efficiency and Freedom – inspire its more than 100,000 Associates to create value for all its partners and deliver growth they are proud of every day.

Job Purpose

Reporting to the Category Leadership Head, the Category Manager is responsible for delivering best in class category leadership with our customers to drive growth and customer engagement. Using a mix of market, shopper and customer insights to identify category growth opportunities, the role leverages / executes these through excellence in all Category Leadership initiatives, tactics and practices. Key initiatives and deliverables of the role are to lead the development and execution of the category picture of success (including quality & quantity distribution levers) through strategic category plans, enabling us to build strong and sustainable category partnerships / captaincies for mutual, profitable and sustainable category growth.

Key Responsibilities

Category and insights business orientation:

• Deliver best in class Category Management by taking an objective total category perspective when providing market, consumer and shopper insights to customer/operational teams;
• Responsible for the Range review process from inception through implementation and delivery of post review analysis;
• Delivery of Mars NPD launches into account including creating category focused selling stories, identifying listing opportunities/challenges and providing merchandising solutions to maximize on shelf delivery;
• Collaboration with insight sales to deliver in depth account understanding;
• KPI/Performance tracking and delivery including Core Range compliance and distribution.

Strategy development and vision:

• Deliver the category vision content, tailored to the retailer by developing a clear 3-year Category strategy aligned with the retailer;
• Ensure our interactions with the customer leads to a competitive advantage through understanding the Mars Vision and Account vision / strategies, ensuring a collaborative category relationship to enable aligned account strategy plans;
• Understand and deploy vision to the shelf for the account, collaborating with Sales to set joint targets using the picture of success model.

Customer relationships:

• Ensure Category growth and objectivity are at heart of all interactions with Customers.
• Delivery of customer relationships, meetings and interaction vs the contact strategy.
• Attend account team meetings and establish yourself as an integral part of their team.

Requirements:

• Customer experience with ability to engage, influence and impact customers by providing guidance on strategic direction of category;
• Category Leadership expertise in relevant Category Management practices;
• Broad and in depth understanding of FMCG context and retail landscape;
• High analytical acumen with ability to drive and translate insights into relevant strategies and tactics (actions / initiatives) internally and for execution with our customers;
• Good understanding of annual planning process internally.

Mars is an equal opportunity employer, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. If you need assistance or accommodation during the application process because of a disability, it is available upon request. The company is pleased to provide such assistance, and no applicant will be penalized as a result of such a request.