General Trade Manager, Malaysia

Job Location: ​Kuala Lumpur​

Kuala Lumpur

Company description

Ferrero is a family-owned company with a truly progressive and global outlook and iconic brands such as Nutella®, Tic Tac®, Ferrero Rocher®, Raffaello®, Kinder Bueno® and Kinder Surprise®. As the love for our brands continues to grow, so too does our global reach. Represented in more than 50 countries, with products sold in more than 170, the Ferrero Group is loved by generations around the world. The secret to our global success? 38,767  dedicated employees who celebrate care and quality to craft a business, careers and brands we are proud of. Join us, and you could be one of them.

Diversity Statement

Ferrero is committed to building a diverse and inclusive culture in which all employees feel welcomed and appreciated and have the same opportunities. We believe all of our people are equally talented in their own way. In nurturing the curiosity and natural abilities of our employees, we provide them, generation after generation, the means to succeed personally and professionally, enabling them to craft their journey at Ferrero. The diversity of our talents is what makes our work environment multicultural, innovative and highly rewarding.

About the Role:

As a General Trade Manager, you will be responsible in reaching sales targets of the customers assigned, developing the business of general trade, analyzing their performance, and ensuring distribution in general trade. 

Main Responsibilities:

Sales Strategy

• Lead and develop general trade planning to implement the strategic goals set for the business growth
• Propose commercial policy, programs and customer plans for GT
• Sales Forecast, Budget and Objectives
• Proposes to the Country Sales Manager a sales budget (volumes, trade spending, Visibility etc.) for General Trade by key partners
• Monitors sales targets achievement regularly and have contingency plans in place

Customer Plans

• Analyzes key partner’s performance and defines future business opportunities
• Defines key partner-specific goals and strategy
• Defines action plan with specific KPIs 
• Take actions on issues with credits
• Review proposals on general trade and conform compliance with commercial policy
• Regular communication with key partners and schedule monthly back-check
• Monitor financial aging report and ensure it is aligned in accordance to distributor’s protocol

Negotiation Activities

• Defines and work with distributor to negotiates contracts with all key partners  
• Develops with the support to achieve the strategic goals/projects
• Negotiates with key-partners, the session/annual sales promotion/trade incentive according to Sales plan

Trade Spending & Control

• Keeps trade spending within the guidelines established by the Ferrero commercial policy
• Monitor execution and sales target
• Timely submission of sales activities documents (TSA) to Country Sales Manager
• Timely submission of payment approval from accrual to distributor to facilitate payment to key partners
• Analyzes trade spending to optimize ROI

Deployment & Control

• Works closely with distributor, develop action plans to achieve sales target with co-efforts
• Personally follow up and ensure communication cascaded by sales team to key partners  
• Monitors the actual in-store deployment at national level, follow up and coordinates with sales teams to ensure local execution is align with define plans and policies
• Evaluates and proposes new plan/strategies from the input of Distributor 
• Monitors Sales, inventory KPIs of the key partners
• Resolves problems with distributor’s team on a national level when required
• Validates the data/ information provided by Distributor to ensure accuracy for decision making

Who we are looking for:

• Mininum Bachelor’s Degree in relevant field
• 4-7 years’ experience in similar roles; Strong proven track record of effective partnership with Distributor and Key Wholesalers
• Market Knowledge: Familiar with GT & ISM retail landscape, operations and dynamics
• Willing to travel across the regions in West and East Malaysia for meeting with Distributor Sales team, Key Wholesalers and store visits
• Experience in SPF category is a plus (Sweet Packaged Food: Confectionery, Biscuit, Ice-cream etc)
• Strong focus on Execution to drive sell-out thru product availability and visibility; a good team player – collaborative, strong sense of mutuality and empathy
• Proactive, dynamic, responsible, able to work under pressure and meet deadlines, result-oriented 
• Fluency in English; Bahasa/Mandarin/Cantonese preferred
• Familiarity in Microsoft Teams, powerpoint, excel etc.

How to be successful in the role and at Ferrero:

Consumers, quality and care are at the heart of everything we do. So, to be successful at Ferrero, you’ll need to be just as consumer and product centric as we are - dedicated to crafting brilliant results for consumers around the world. 

Strong analytical mind, attention to details on one hand, and ability to cooperate with employees at all levels and great organisational skills on the other, would be key to success.  Employee contribution and engagement at Ferrero is based on the individual, team and organisation dimension, so you should have the ability to work independently, as a part of the team and build good relations with stakeholders at all levels.  Being flexible and dealing with a dynamic working environment as well as the ability to embed new knowledge and skills in existing competencies will definitely help you to become high performer here.