* Led the entire Inventory Planning department including 12 direct reports with accountability for over 35,000,000 units of inventory annually across 200+ classes of merchandise including apparel, footwear, accessories, and beauty products.* Responsible for all endeavors linked with inventory management including store inventory planning, allocations and replenishment, assortment planning framework and localization strategies, report creation, and performance analysis.* Collaborated cross-functionally with Merchandising and Operations leaders on product and placement strategies to ensure alignment across all teams. Led executive meetings, provided valuable insights to catalyze business growth, and supported strategic planning and decision-making processes.-- Achieved five consecutive years of inventory productivity increases and maximized GMROI profitability by 182% compared to historic levels by selecting ideal store locations and devising inventory deployment strategies aligned with customer demographics and demand patterns.-- Spearheaded the launch of a Size Pack Optimization initiative that facilitated the purchase of optimized pack sizes into the DC and store replenishment of apparel items by size, elevating in-stock rates by 247 basis points. -- Led company-wide transformation project to upgrade the entire assortment planning process in collaboration with a third-party consultant group. The revised process led to a 30% reduction of unproductive items, lower levels of markdowns, and improved in-stock rates of the most productive items.

-- Built new reporting tools and allocation processes to increase efficiency resulting in a decrease of aged inventory and generating almost 2x improvement to the average weekly sell-through compared to historic levels.-- Headed the development of assortment localization strategies and in collaboration with Merchandising, orchestrated the deployment of tailored assortments by market, climate, demographic, and store type resulting in more relevant assortments, accelerated inventory turns by 71%, and a 10pt reduction of markdown inventory penetration.-- Illuminated opportunities to improve supply chain lead times and conducted a cost-benefit analysis for the executive team’s approval. This led to a collaborative project to create supply chain efficiencies, resulting in a 30% lead time reduction in the best stores and a 19% increase in sales of replenished items.-- Navigated through the challenges of the pandemic and optimized limited inventory resources by segmenting merchandise classes into curated store groups, resulting in a 70% inventory profitability improvement in 2020 and 2021 compared to pre-pandemic years, ensuring company survival and employee retention.

* Responsible for store inventory planning, allocations, and assortment planning framework for the Girls and Accessory business divisions.-- Headed store sales grading and inventory planning for a portfolio of 1K+ stores at peak

* Led strategic initiatives including administering technology implementations of NPD and Planalytics analytics tools and oversaw the “test and learn” process. Presented business insights and recommendations to leadership team. -- Analyzed customer and competitor insights in NPD and proprietary analytics tools to identify opportunities and present the quantified sales benefit to the merchandising leadership team. This collaborative action delivered tailored, segmented assortments to achieve a $20M increase in the Guys' department and a $3M boost in Beauty sales.-- Examined historical market share data in NPD to highlight areas for sales enhancement and revitalized the inventory strategy of replenished Jeans to align with competitors, boosting Spring sales of Jeans by 25%.-- Facilitated the company through financial turnaround by effectively managing limited inventory resources to maximize strategic allocation, addressing financial challenges, and positioning the company for future success.

* Responsible for store inventory planning, allocations and replenishment, assortment planning framework, and performance analysis.-- Headed store sales grading and inventory planning for a portfolio of 1K+ stores and 273 merchandise classes, managed the opening of 50-100 stores and 30 remodels annually, and steered cross-functional collaboration for streamlined operations and selecting the best assortments per new store.

* Led store inventory planning, sales planning and global promotional planning activities and the executive consensus process.-- Originated the bottom-up pre-season planning process and collaborative business review with the merchandising teams to improve inventory efficiency by store volume segment. This action increased regular-priced inventory penetration to over 80% compared to less than 60% in prior years, annual GM rate increases of 100bps on average and set the groundwork for other long-term profitability improvements.