Samantha Hyde Email & Phone Number

Fort Wayne, Indiana, United States

“People are not your most important asset. The right people are. Get the right people on the bus, the wrong people off the bus, and the right people in the right seats.” - Jim CollinsWe specialize in recruitment services tailored to the home decor, furniture, lighting, apparel, and accessories industries. With clients spanning across the nation, we offer comprehensive recruitment support aimed at simplifying the process for our partners. Our commitment to excellence is reflected in our "white glove service" approach, ensuring a seamless experience from start to finish. We take pride in our robust candidate pipeline, continuously expanding and refining it to meet evolving needs. For inquiries, please don't hesitate to reach out to me directly.

Fort Wayne, Indiana, United States

Fort Wayne, Indiana Area

2019 versus 2018 Website Achievements:• Increased overall sales by 211% • Increased traffic by 136%• Increased orders by 246%• Increased Returning Customer Rate by 8%Job Responsibilities:• Developed annual sales forecast by month and week. • Created & implemented a plan (by month, by week) for meeting revenue target. • Developed and deployed Marketing strategies by tying back to quarter & annual objectives/goals.• Reviewed monthly channel results, reporting to management on channel sales performance and making recommendations when changes are necessary to drive improved results.• Set vision and strategy for shopping and purchase experience on website.• Led and managed site experience, site operations and site merchandising.• Ensured accuracy of all creative assets, linking, promotions and product attribution on the website.• Drove customer growth through strategy creation in SEO, SEM, PPC, Social Media & Marketing.• Oversaw the creative and digital team to ensure adherence to schedule and priorities.• Managed and worked closely with 3rd party vendor(s) on project delivery, strategy execution, and best practices.

South Whitley, In

- Managed a $10.9 million dollar open to buy.- Developed and led repeatable and sustainable forecasting processes.- Made sales forecast recommendations to inventory planning.- Developed quarterly SKU goal(s) that aid in ensuring that the product assortment strategies meet or exceed the sales plan. - Responsible for revenue and profit goals for owned categories.- Ensured SKU productivity is maximized for the top volume categories. - Set item pricing consistent with assortment strategy and margin goals- Managed the product life cycle from item creation to lifecycle decline.- Conducted analysis of competitive markets.- Analyzed competitor’s product mix and pricing.- Curated a thoughtful experience for customers in owned categories by constantly improving page content and product strategy. - Assisted in development of category strategy promotions in collaboration with Marketing.

South Whitley, In

- Developed companies marketing strategy, based on knowledge of its objectives, market characteristics, and cost.- Organized and direct the activities of the marketing team, to ensure quality and timeliness of campaign completion. - Monitored campaign progress, providing status updates to leadership, managing risk, and taking corrective action as necessary.- Managed and own strategic vision for wholesale business.- Grew Wal-Mart business by 20.74% ($288,175) in 2016.- Grew Amazon business by 10.97% ($146,565) in 2016.- Helped grow the business by three additional accounts: - Joss & Main, Darby Smart, & Google Shopping. - Managed catalog strategy, planning, and schedule.- Primary interface with external partners.- Coordinated activities, as it relates to PR events and sponsorships.

- Developed a sales planning process for the CEO and CFO.- Produced first sales plan in company history: by brand, category, and subcategory.- Worked with the CFO to ensure the sales plan and strategic goals were aligned for the Fiscal Year, Quarter, and Period. - Led SKU rationalization process and implementation. - Managed 10 vendors; from weekly purchase orders to vendor relations.

Fort Wayne, Indiana Area

• Managed a $45.9 million dollar open to buy. • Developed a top down, bottoms up SKU forecast and ensure SKU productivity is maximized for top volume accounts such as Dillard's, Military, QVC, Macy's, Zappos, Belk and Von Maur. • Developed & led a repeatable & sustainable forecasting processes for the Key Account Managers to use & follow. These processes have proven to ensure product availability, which is turn ensures that they Key Account Sales team is successfully hitting sales targets.• Developed buying tools that our Department Store Buyers utilized to communicate assortment, pricing information, seasonal forecasts, as well as track open to buy dollars. • Facilitated weekly meetings with Department Store Buying teams to ensure that we are meeting sales expectations, providing sales materials, & aligning on overall business. • Partnered with the Director of Finance to ensure the seasonal forecast was aligned with strategic goals for the Fiscal Year, Quarter & Period. • Consolidated the seasonal forecast by Category, Department, Class & presented the final buy to the Executive Team for review & sign off.• Developed & led the repeatable & sustainable process flow for contracts, which the Sales Operations team follows. These processes have proven to ensure proper segmentation, allocation & delivery timing, maximizing & improving overall sales. • Analyzed each accounts merchandise mix & daily demand activity resulting in weekly forecast updates, which drives end-of-life inventory levels, resulting in more efficient inventory management for our Accounts.• Worked with Planning team to establish & maintain style-level ladder plans to proactively adjust forecasts and identify need for forecast adjustments and identify risks within the inventory, and communicate to dependent departments.• Collaborated with Merchant team on creating & managing the seasonal marketing plans.

Fort Wayne, Indiana Area

• Responsible for creating, developing, and managing top-down product demand forecast based on overall company financial plans• Developed advanced, efficient processes for forecasting sales at style/color level across all sales distribution channels, working closely with Channel Forecasting Managers to ensure that demand for respective divisions is being met through management of inventory segmentation process• Analyzed merchandise mix, daily demand activity, economic and business factors, seasonal selling peaks and related product performance, resulting in weekly forecast updates that will manage manufacturing capacity, building inventory and projecting end-of-life inventory levels of assigned product category• Established and maintained department, class and channel-level open-to-buy processes to identify need for forecast adjustments and proactively identify risks within the inventory• Worked with Planning team to establish and maintain style-level ladder plans to identify need for forecast adjustments and proactively identify risks within the inventory• Identified outliers in large data sets, and make recommendations based on these findings to optimize the merchandise forecast• Managed weekly meetings with Operations for assigned product category to discuss issues regarding product availability, shipping, sourcing, quality and manufacturing of signature product• Maintainedreporting activities on key analytics and work with Business Intelligence team to optimize reporting

• Assisted Director of Merchandise Management, Merchandise Manager, and Merchandise Analyst’s in researching new product categories.• Assisted and made recommendations on Market analysis regarding new categories involving category trends, competitors, seasonality, pricing, sales, methods of marketing, customer buying habits, and distribution• Compiled and performed statistical analysis of historical sales and market dates, make forecast recommendations for product lines.• Conducted, compiled, and reported competitive analysis research on competing companies in the market on trends, colors, styles, patterns, and price.• Assisted supporting strategic initiative as it relates to all categories and new categories in global economy.• Collaborated with Product Design, Sales, Marketing, Visual Merchandise, and Finance to make recommendations on product lifecycle, ideal assortment, and pricing. • Assisted in SKU level analysis to create and update ABCD classifications for all products.• Assisted in project management of Product innovation process for new categories.• Provided a category analysis to Executive team to support special projects and initiatives.

• Worked with sales forecasts and demand in order to communicate appropriate shortages/overages.• Improved forecast accuracy by analyzing forecast to demand and making adjustments when necessary.• Worked with the Product Development Department discussing sales demand, future assortments, pricing, and product life cycles.• Conducted research and made recommendations for product life cycles (release date, retire date, etc.) and ideal assortments based on region (age, customer, demographic, etc).• Participated in competitive shopping and the analysis of customer feedback in order to create SKU plan. • Analyzed customer feedback and buying patterns to develop useful information for predicting future sales.• Assisted in identifying the right price for new and existing products utilizing customer feedback and competitive pricing taking into consideration Vera Bradley’s gross margin goals.• Participated in various department meetings and vendor conference calls along with project timelines discussions.

Apparel Merchandising And Product Development

Minor, Marketing

Activities and Societies: American Marketing Association (AMA)

Minor, Entrepreneurship