Celeste Richardson Email & Phone Number

Westfield, In, Us

Indiana, United States

Indianapolis, Indiana Area

Indianapolis, Indiana

Indianapolis, Indiana

Led a broad cross-functional team of merchandising, marketing, digital operations, store operations and supply chain to deliver a premium brand and product omni-channel strategy that reflects the needs of the customer and internal financial targets.• Influenced and managed vendor relationships with sales and leadership teams within Nike, Adidas, and Under Armour, as well as many other premium brands to position Finish Line as a market leader.• Mentored future leaders within the company through formal and informal mentoring process.• Recruited new team members and evolved organizational structure of team.• Analyzed sales, inventory and margin with cross-functional team and created weekly action steps to continuously meet targets which were reported to the Executive Leadership team.• Conducted monthly business reviews internally with cross-functional team and externally with each major vendor.• Initiated quarterly marketing strategies and presented to broader marketing group as part of the seasonal kick off.• Partnered with the digital operations team to ensure effective engagement with the customer and influence customer journey on eCommerce and through social media.

Indianapolis, Indiana

Responsible for brand and product omni-channel strategy for Kids Footwear. Managed relationships with 15 major footwear brands. Trained and developed 2 associate buyers, 1 planner and 3 product allocators. • Increased comp sales by high single digits in 2014 resulting in winning the “Buying Office of the Year” award.• Grew eCommerce sales at a faster rate than brick and mortar through working strategically with digital operations and leveraging personalization technology.• Conducted monthly business reviews internally with cross-functional team and externally with each vendor and created effective strategies to ensure targets are being met. • Initiated product marketing strategies to reflect customer profile.• Acted as a technology change agent to implement a new reporting system which streamlined weekly report activity for entire Merchant team and increased total productivity.

Indianapolis, Indiana

Responsible for supporting Buyer to create brand and product omni-channel strategies for Women’s Footwear. Forecasted demand of key programs, as well as created product allocation strategies.• Facilitated weekly calls with the digital operations team to propose new opportunities and review metrics of eCommerce business and social engagement.• Communicated weekly selling metrics with the footwear team and created summary documents for Senior Management.• Presented customer profile of each footwear program as part of the quarterly marketing strategy kick off.

Menomonee Falls, Wi

Developed vendor base to deliver optimal return on investment, meet changing customer expectations and align with long term brand strategies. Introduced new and competitive products with high price to value proposition.• Generated strategies and customer focused products that produced a double digit sales increase over the prior year.• Managed team of designers, buyers, sourcing and marketing to ensure product reflects the brand aesthetic to deliver on customer expectations.• Reduced production costs by 20% through strategic negotiations and driving materials scale to improve product margin.• Created sweater development calendar to shorten production lead time in partnership with the vendor community, which was adopted as a company-wide standard.

Menomonee Falls, Wi

Collaborated with the Product Manager to build product strategy for the Sonoma knit tops business. Solely responsible for driving the special sizes product development to achieve sales growth and profitability.• Produced an athleisure inspired product assortment based on customer trends in half of the standard production lead time.• Received the award for top merchant team for four consecutive quarters and top merchant team of the year in 2010.• Responsible for managing all competitive landscape analysis for senior management.

Menomonee Falls, Wi

PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT COORDINATOR, SONOMA / Kohl’s Corporation / Menomonee Falls, WI / 2008-2009Assisted in managing development, execution and production of the Knit business in coordination with the Product Manager. • Managed competitive landscape analysis and reporting to senior management.• Collaborated with design, technical design and production teams to ensure brand continuity and product standards are achieved.

B.S. Apparel Merchandising

Activities and Societies: Zeta Tau Alpha

Minor - Business

Certificate In Costume Construction Technology, Fashion Design