Senior Finance Analyst - Retail

Our Role

This role will primarily be responsible for providing business partnering and analytical support to the Retail channel.

The role will own the month end processes for retail, including the preparation and posting of journals. Ensuring that all numbers in the retail P&L are correctly accounted for each month, with all material variances to the budget/forecast understood. As well as working closely with the retail operations team to manage the cost base throughout the year.

A large part of the role will involve the ongoing production of relevant weekly and monthly business reporting and the development of various tools and templates to drive sales and manage costs. You will have a clear understanding of the retail business and utilise your finance expertise to assist the retail team in maximising business performance.

As well as giving insight into the performance this person will support the sales and operating cost budgeting and forecasting process for retail, working with both the Retail team and Property team to produce the future business plans.

In addition, on a more ad-hoc basis, you may also be required to provide a high level of commercial and analytical support on a range of matters such as conducting shop profitability analysis, sales trend analysis, store cost control and trading activity performance.

• Provide financial and commercial support to stores, area managers, the head office retail team and the retail director.
• Ownership of weekly trade reporting, providing clear and detailed financial analysis on store trading performances, including insights and recommendations to maximise store performance.
• Ownership of month end processes, including the preparation and posting of journals.
• Production of monthly divisional and store P&L’s, as well as holding P&L reviews with the area managers to review store performance and drive action.
• Identifying and driving process improvements in month end and trade reporting tasks through automation and process simplification.
• Leading the Budgeting and Forecasting process for all store cost areas to deliver a challenging but achievable budget, including phasing, articulating building blocks and drivers, and setting timelines and deliverables.
• Providing insight with the purpose of improving the profitability of the Retail channel.
• Provide adhoc analysis and insight on retail performance.
• Support the Central Property team, including month-end close, Budget & Forecasting & ad-hoc tasks.

• Part qualified Accountant (we are unable to support ACA)
• Prior experience in a business partnering and/or commercial finance role, preferably in a retail, fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) or similar environment
• Excellent excel skills
• Familiar with forecasting and budgeting process
• Strong interest in building an understanding of the key drivers of the business
• Able to work in partnership with the business to drive operational improvements
• The ability to be able to communicate effectively across Finance & Non Finance stakeholders, as well as senior management
• Highly adaptable and able to comfortably work to tight deadlines and/or varying business priorities
• Take full ownership and accountability over designated areas of responsibilities

• A passion for retail, tenacity, and an eye for detail and accuracy
• Dynamic, enthusiastic and a proactive individual
• Able to effectively communicate to and influence senior management of the business and have the confidence to challenge them on their outlook
• Flexible and adaptable approach to working
• The ability to focus on the detail, but also grasp the bigger picture
• Must be self-sufficient and be able to manage adhoc requests
• A team player with good communication skills, who has the ability to build relationships across the business

At The White Company, we value our employees for always going the extra mile for every one of our customers; we reward this with great benefits and competitive salaries.

• Discount
  -Up to 50% discount
• Holiday – 25 days rising to 28 days after 3 yrs
• Holiday Buy – opportunity to buy up to an additional 5 days holiday
• 10% Bonus…