Merchandise & Assortment Planning

Description

Merchandise & Assortment Planning Course

The objective of the merchandise and assortment planning course is to teach the basic principles of merchandise and assortment planning and retail best practices.

Who Is It Suitable For?

Martec’s merchandise and assortment planning e-learning course is designed for:

• Everyone involved in merchandise and assortment or range planning, including merchandisers and planners and their teams
• IT departments
• Vendors supplying and selling merchandise and assortment planning systems will also benefit from a better understanding of the key processes and best practices.

Course Objectives

By the end of this class, learners will be able to:

• Describe an overview of merchandise planning
• Explain the pre-requisites to good planning
• Identify the steps in a top down planning process
• Explain the principles of range or assortment strategy and assortment architecture
• Describe the steps in building a range or assortment plan
• Apply the concept of GMROI to make sure that the interdependency between gross margin and inventory turn is logical and well thought out
• Adjust the planning process for non-store channels.

Detailed Content

The detailed content includes:

• Overview of planning :
  • The merchandise management process
  • Planning flow
  • Why plan?
  • Plan approaches
  • Who builds the plans?
• Merchandise and assortment planning pre-requisites:
  • Business plan input
  • End of season review
  • Seasonal plans
  • Merchandise hierarchy
• Top down planning:
  • Plan development exercise
  • Setting plan objectives
  • Phasing the sales plan over the season
  • Planning inventory
  • Planning margins
  • From department to class level planning
  • Unit planning
  • Auto-balancing the plan
• Range or assortment planning:
  • Range/assortment strategy
  • Range analysis
  • Range construction
• Range architecture :
  • Good, better, best
  • Competitor price point analysis
  • Price point planning
  • Assortment options
  • Rate of sale
  • Range plan
  • Product selection factors
  • Style curves
  • Market buy plan
  • End of season range review / style out
  • GMROI and turn
  • Channel planning (store, online)
  • Plan review:
  • Merchandise plan checklist
  • Some tips
  • Sensibility checks
• Mastery Test

  Each module has its own mastery test and learners that achieve a 70% pass mark and complete the end of class survey will receive a certificate on completion.  They will also be awarded a Martec digital badge showcasing their achievement.  See this page for more details.

Benefits of Studying This Program

Learners studying this program will:

• Plan better with more confidence.
• Adapt plans to changing circumstances more easily
• Progressively improve the accuracy of plans as they iterate round seasons
• Achieve better results for their companies

Hours of Study

5-6 hours.  We recommend studying in approximately 30 minute sessions to aid memory retention.

Resources Included

The class includes the following downloadable resources for printing and review:

• MS Excel merchandise planning workbook with exercise sheets from the class
• Job Aid - Factors to Consider in Researching Merchandise and Assortment Plans
• Report on 'What’s Changed In Merchandise and Assortment Planning Because Of COVID?'

Pre-Requisites Necessary

A good understanding of basic buying and merchandise management processes, such as that taught in our Buying and Merchandising class.

After This Program?

Following this program, we recommend our Demand Forecasting class for in season management against plan, and Allocation and Replenishment to help execute initial injections better and maintain availability on the shelf.

Video

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