Head of Merchandising - Cotton On South Africa

Be Who You Are. Love What You Do.

We’re an Aussie brand with our feet on the ground and our heart in our people.

Bringing you a brand-new opportunity in our Cotton On Merchandise Team.

The Role

We’re looking for a commercially sharp, values-led leader to head up the Merchandise function for Cotton On Africa. A strategic partner to the Country Manager and global brand teams, this role is responsible for enabling our brand strategy through smart, locally grounded merchandise planning and stock execution.

You’ll lead a high-performing team of managers and specialists across brands and categories, shaping plans with global and local partners, driving stock performance across all channels, and delivering strong commercial outcomes.

From allocation precision and timing to sell-through strategies and trading actions, you’ll own the in-country execution of product performance, ensuring we land the right stock, in the right place, at the right time. All while fostering a team culture that values curiosity, accountability, and collaboration

Key Accountabilities

Lead merchandise strategy delivery in Africa

• Translate and activate global merchandise strategy in Africa with precision, ensuring alignment with brand intent and customer opportunity.
• Influence OTB to match brand and category opportunities, including optimal stock flow and availability aligned to seasonality, sales curves, and key trade moments.

Lead partnerships across global and local teams

• Serve as the lead merchandise partner to the global support centre, representing Africa’s needs while ensuring strategic alignment.
• Work closely with the Country MD and cross-functional leaders to connect merchandising to broader brand, retail, and customer goals.

Drive commercial performance across all channels

• Own stock performance across retail and ecommerce from planning through to trade execution.
• Lead investment and trade reviews, surfacing opportunities and risks early and driving action with pace.
• Partner with DC and logistics teams to ensure volume planning and stock readiness supports commercial outcomes.

Coach and develop a high-performing merchandise team

• Build a team that’s customer-led, commercially curious, and confident in execution.
• Foster a culture of feedback and coaching, with regular rhythms of check-ins and development that grow capability and support succession.
• Model the Cotton On Group values and lead a culture of accountability, care, and commercial focus.

Embed operational excellence and continuous improvement

• Champion efficient planning processes that support speed, productivity, clarity, and strategic focus.
• Review store, site, and DC performance to validate stock positioning and identify improvement opportunities.
• Encourage smarter trading by using creative, brand-aligned levers beyond markdowns.

Build strong cross-functional and cross-brand collaboration

• Foster strong working relationships with Marketing, VM, Retail, and Finance to drive aligned trade actions and deliver on customer promise.
• Collaborate across brands to share insights, learnings, and best practices, supporting shared success across the Africa portfolio.

Desired Knowledge, Experience and Skills

• A relevant bachelor’s degree or equivalent qualification in Commerce, Business Management, or a related field
• 8 -10 years’ experience in Merchandise Planning or Buying, with at least 5 years in senior leadership within Retail apparel space.
• Proven experience delivering commercial outcomes across multiple channels in a complex, fast-paced environment
• Strong strategic thinking and analytical capability, with the ability to connect insight to action quickly
• Demonstrated ability to influence and partner across global teams with confidence, credibility, and clarity
• Deep commercial acumen with a track record in optimizing stock productivity, margin, and trade performance
• A people-first leadership style with a strong focus on coaching, capability building, and accountability
• Exceptional communicator who brings others along and builds trust across functions
• Strong negotiation and problem-solving skills, grounded in curiosity and business context
• Comfortable working in a matrix with the ability to navigate complexity and lead through collaboration
• Known for integrity, resilience, and building high-impact relationships that deliver results
• Passionate about customer connection, execution excellence, and enabling great work through great leadership

It’s more than a job. It’s about making a positive difference in everything we do.

Who are we?

A diverse team of 20,000 around the world who love to think Big and have fun along the way. We develop, reward and recognise our team members, so they can feel empowered to reach their full potential. We know life’s more fun when you’re free to be you and our team bring their point of difference, making us into the unique global retailer we are today.

Being You can take you places at the Cotton On Group. Join us and let’s do good things together.

At Cotton On, we are focused on building a culture centred in belonging, and we are committed to creating workplaces where each individual can show up as their whole self, having an equal opportunity to succeed with us.

We are proud of our diverse global workforce of 20,000 team members from countless nationalities, and we strongly welcome and encourage individuals of all backgrounds to apply with us.

We are focused on bringing more voices, experiences and backgrounds to our workforce as we drive diverse and inclusive outcomes for our team and our customers.

If you have any individual needs in order to fully participate in the recruitment process, please contact us at [email protected] so we may support you in completing the job application process.