Senior Pricing Analyst at Longos in Support Centre, Vaughan

Job description

• Are you passionate about data, analytics, and influencing business decisions? Join us as a Senior Pricing Analyst and help shape pricing strategies, uncover market insights, and drive profitable growth through data-driven recommendations.
• Position: Senior Pricing Analyst
• Reporting to the Senior Manager, Consumer and Pricing Insights, the incumbent supports the pricing function end to end: administering pricing strategy and supporting rules; running store price zone reviews and changes; maintaining the item price tier framework; coordinating in-store and online competitive price audits; producing the recurring pricing and competitive index reporting suite; measuring the results of pricing and optimization programs; and maintaining the tools and models that support all of it. The incumbent manages the day-to-day working relationship with the pricing software provider and with external price audit and market data vendors, and partners with the Insights team to bring stronger analytical methods into the pricing process. The role carries no direct reports but acts as the technical authority for pricing analytics and as the primary pricing partner to the merchandising organization.

Responsibilities

• Pricing Strategy and Execution
• Administers and maintains pricing strategies and supporting rules, reviewing and modifying rules to keep the business process current.
• Coordinates the daily activities of the pricing function in support of corporate objectives.
• Runs the store price zone review and change process, including the analysis behind it, so zones reflect market conditions, competitive position and guest needs.
• Maintains the item price tier framework — Staples, Known Value Items (KVI), Non-KVI and Longo’s private label — and keeps tier assignments current as strategy evolves.
• Models the potential impact of pricing strategy revisions through what-if and scenario analysis, and identifies opportunities to adjust pricing.
• Prepares material for, participates in and contributes to pricing updates with senior leadership
• Competitive Price Audits and Market Intelligence
• Owns the end-to-end in-store price audit process: builds and refreshes audit lists, coordinates the third-party vendor, validates results and loads them for use.
• Prepares the audit callout list — items where retails should move up or down to improve competitiveness — and follows up with Category Managers on the actions taken.
• Owns the online (web scraping) audit process, including data quality checks and vendor management.
• Produces competitive price index reporting comparing Longo’s zone retails to key competitors.
• Pricing Reporting and Analysis
• Delivers the recurring weekly, bi-weekly and period reporting suite, including the pricing tier report, promotional discrepancy report, Staples competitor report and period inflation report.
• Measures and reports on the results of pricing programs, including margin opportunity lists and price optimization initiatives.
• Executes periodic reporting to Directors and senior leadership on the results of implemented pricing strategies, and explains what the numbers mean.
• Distributes reporting to the appropriate audiences and translates analysis into a clear recommended action.
• Pricing Tools and Systems
• Maintains and continuously improves the price elasticity models, including supporting automation of elasticity refreshes, to improve the quality of recommendations.
• Acts as business owner of the Price Master tool: maintains it, supports and trains users, and drives enhancements that improve pricing workflows and the price change process.
• Applies automation and analytics tools — Excel and Power Query, SQL, Python, VBA, Power BI and AI tools — to improve the speed, accuracy and reach of pricing analysis.
• Partnership, Training and Knowledge Sharing
• Acts as the day-to-day pricing partner to Category Managers and merchandising directors, and as the liaison between the pricing function and the merchandising teams.
• Partners with the Insights team to bring data science and machine learning capability into pricing analysis and reporting.
• Works closely with Merchandising, Private Label, Finance, Master Data Management, Store Operations and IT to deliver pricing initiatives.
• Acts as the liaison with the pricing software provider and with third-party providers of market retail price audits and data.
• Serves as subject matter expert on pricing tools, rules and reporting, and supports and trains users across the business.

Requirements

• Accuracy and attention to detail — reporting goes to senior leadership and drives price decisions, so it has to be right the first time.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, with sound commercial judgement.
• Ability to explain complex analysis in plain language and turn it into a clear recommendation for senior leadership.
• Excellent oral and written business communication skills; comfortable presenting to senior leadership.
• Strong relationship management capabilities, with the ability to influence without direct authority and hold a position when the data supports it.
• Strong prioritization and multitasking skills against a fixed reporting calendar.
• Ownership mentality — takes a deliverable from request through to action taken.
• Curiosity and a continuous improvement mindset; actively looks for ways to automate and simplify.
• Strong guest and internal-customer service orientation.
• Works effectively with minimal supervision and consistently meets deadlines.
• Required
• Post-secondary degree or diploma in Business Administration, Economics, Finance, Mathematics, Statistics or a related field.
• A minimum of 5 years of experience in pricing, retail or category analytics, category management or a comparable analytical role; grocery, CPG or multi-unit retail experience is strongly preferred.
• Experience with multi-zone pricing and forecasting methodologies.
• Comprehensive knowledge of the fundamental concepts, practices and procedures of retail pricing, including price zones, item tiers and Known Value Items, price indexing, price ladders, promotional pricing and margin management.
• Strong financial analysis skills, including gross profit, margin and tonnage impact analysis, forecasting and scenario modelling.
• Advanced Excel — complex modelling, Power Query, and reading and writing macros / VBA development.
• Data extraction and transformation experience using SQL, Access and Oracle.
• Experience building reports and dashboards using Power BI, MicroStrategy or other BI reporting tools; strong PowerPoint skills for executive-level reporting.
• Demonstrated track record of delivering recurring reporting on a fixed schedule for multiple audiences, with a high standard of accuracy.
• Experience owning or administering a pricing, merchandising or comparable business system, including user support, troubleshooting and testing.
• Strong project management, analytical, organizing and planning skills, with the ability to run several deliverables at once against firm deadlines.
• Experience with an ERP system or pricing optimization software.
• Python, R or SAS for regression modelling, time series modelling and price elasticity, and experience working with transaction-level (TLOG) data.
• Experience with syndicated and third-party market data (for example NielsenIQ) and with price audit vendors.

Skills

Required

• Accuracy and attention to detail
• Sound commercial judgement
• Ownership mentality
• Consistently meets deadlines
• Strong PowerPoint skills
• Project management skills

Preferred

• Experience with price audit vendors