Director of Operations

The Director of Operations owns everything that touches inventory or an order, from the purchase order to the customer: purchasing and inventory, receiving and the warehouse, drop-ship and agency order fulfillment, the Police Supply retail operation, trade-in and pre-owned inventory, the facility, the technology the operation runs on, and the operating standards that hold it all together. The President leads revenue and the sales teams.

The Controller leads finance and business operations. This seat leads operations. This is a business-leadership seat, not a retail store manager role. We are hiring a business leader with an operations mindset who can grow into running day-to-day operations, so the President can focus on growth and business development.

This is a new seat. It exists to build the operating discipline that profitable growth requires. The first job is to define the measures our operation runs on and publish them weekly. The second is to move them. This seat is responsible for execution, delivery, service and the customer experience across every channel, and works in step with sales so that nothing operational is the reason sales cannot grow.

This seat is measured in three areas: operations excellence, customer experience, and inventory and store controls. To scale, we standardize systems, operations and processes, hire well, train better and hold people accountable.

This is a leadership job, not an individual-contributor job. The Director leads through four direct reports and their teams, owns their scorecards, and builds the bench under them. We want a decisive leader who is also a systems thinker: someone who asks whether we are solving the right problem before acting, sees the effect on the teams upstream and downstream, and decides without waiting for perfect information.

• Lead four direct reports and their teams. Run weekly one-on-ones and a weekly operations review, and put every direct report on a written scorecard.
• Own purchasing and inventory: buying, replenishment, stocking levels and product data. Protect margin at the point of purchase.
• Own receiving, the warehouse and fulfillment, including drop-ship and agency orders, from purchase order to invoice.
• Lead Police Supply retail, including alterations and embroidery, and grow it by earning repeat business.
• Own the process for trade-ins, buybacks and pre-owned firearms.
• Set and enforce control standards on the retail floor: cash and POS close, inventory handling, returns and refunds.
• Own the operations SOPs and act as process owner for the ERP. Document it, train people to it and hold them to it.
• Own the facility, the safety program and technology operations.
• Execute the FFL and ATF requirements set by our compliance function.

• Decisive leader with sound judgment. Asks whether we are solving the right problem before acting, sees the effect of a decision on the teams upstream and downstream, and makes the call without waiting for perfect information. This is the single most important qualification.
• Resourceful, curious and self-directed. Teaches themselves new systems and tools and puts them to work without waiting to be trained and without being managed through it. This seat owns technology operations and the use of the ERP and AI tools.
• Seven or more years leading multi-function operations in distribution, wholesale or multi-channel retail, including at least three years managing managers.
• Hands-on leadership of warehouse, purchasing and order-fulfillment operations. Retail operations experience is a plus.
• Has hired, coached up and, where needed, exited managers.
• Accountable for a cost or gross profit result, in dollars and points, not activity. Bring the numbers.
• Has made a measure measurable that was not, and then moved it.
• ERP fluency as an operator, not a passenger. Odoo (ERP) experience is a plus; the ability to make an ERP the source of truth is required.
• Willing to learn and use the AI tools LPD provides. You do not need to be an AI expert, and you cannot be anti-technology. Use the Tools is how we work.
• Age 21 or older.
• Must pass a background check with no restriction on working in the firearms industry.
• Comfortable in a long-established business that is modernizing, with long-tenured people and real institutional knowledge.

• Spanish fluency is a plus.
• Firearms, law enforcement supply, tactical, uniform or other regulated-product distribution.
• Experience with FFL, ATF or ITAR-regulated inventory.
• Drop-ship and…