Director, Merchandise Development - National Retail Partners

At Ashley, inspiring the love of home is at the heart of everything we do. As the world’s largest manufacturer of home furnishings, we’re more than a business — we’re a family driven by innovation, competitiveness, and an unwavering commitment to excellence. We persevere through challenges, push beyond the status quo, and constantly seek better ways to deliver an exceptional customer experience.

Our solutions-first mindset and dedication to growth are why Ashley remains #1 in our industry.

If you’re ready to grow, you’ve come to the right place. With a true “Growth Mindset,” Ashley Furniture invests in developing future leaders and helps every team member learn from the best in the business.

The Director of Merchandise Development leads the end-to-end development of furniture assortments and product programs for assigned National Retail Partners. This role serves as the primary bridge between retailer strategies, consumer insights, and Ashley’s product-development capabilities, creating commercially successful products that deliver against customer expectations for design, quality, value, profitability, and speed to market. Working closely with retailer merchants, account leaders, and cross-functional partners, the Director identifies assortment opportunities, translates market and consumer needs into product concepts, and leads execution from ideation through commercialization and post-launch performance evaluation.

• Lead the complete product development lifecycle for assigned retail partner programs, from opportunity identification and concept creation through commercialization and post-launch assessment.
• Partner directly with retailer merchants, product teams, and account leaders to understand customer strategies, shopper behaviors, assortment gaps, competitive dynamics, and growth opportunities.
• Translate consumer insights and customer objectives into comprehensive product briefs that define target customer, use case, design direction, features, materials, quality standards, pricing objectives, margins, packaging requirements, and launch timing.
• Develop and guide product concepts across upholstery and case goods, including styling, product architecture, materials, finishes, color direction, features, and functionality.
• Establish product roadmaps that align innovation priorities, customer reviews, development milestones, testing requirements, production readiness, and launch objectives.

• Collaborate with Design, Engineering, Manufacturing, Sourcing, Quality, Supply Chain, Finance, Operations, and Sales teams to develop scalable, manufacturable, and commercially compelling products.
• Lead design reviews, prototype evaluations, sample approvals, and stage-gate decisions while maintaining accountability for product direction, timelines, and business outcomes.
• Ensure alignment between product vision, customer requirements, manufacturing capabilities, and operational readiness.
• Drive timely resolution of project risks, trade-offs, dependencies, and execution challenges.

• Partner with commercial and finance leaders to establish target cost structures, margin objectives, and pricing strategies.
• Identify value-engineering opportunities that improve profitability while maintaining customer expectations for quality and design.
• Support retailer line reviews, customer presentations, assortment recommendations, competitive analyses, and product storytelling initiatives.
• Evaluate category performance, market trends, and competitive offerings to inform future development…