Senior Data Scientist, Customer Conversion

8116 - Midtown Office - 2220 W. Broad Street, Richmond, Virginia, 23220

Over twenty years ago, Car Max disrupted the automotive industry and to this day remains the undisputed market leader in a $500B+ industry. With best-in-class financial performance, customer satisfaction, and associate engagement, Car Max is well positioned for continued growth. With this growth, we strive to maintain our analytics-based competitive advantage through our algorithm driven pricing and inventory systems. To do so, we’re currently looking for experienced analysts who are looking to apply their passion for strategic thinking to drive business-critical decisions.

The Customer Conversion Data Science team builds and maintains ML and AI solutions that help Car Max customers navigate and complete their buying journey — efficiently, effectively, and with the best possible experience. Our algorithms are backed by best-in-industry data collected from millions of vehicles purchased and sold by Car Max and millions of consumers as they shopped. These algorithms power intelligent customer communications, AI-driven support experiences, and smarter operational strategies across our customer experience centers and stores.

We partner directly with Product and Operations teams to design, evaluate, and deploy responsible, well-managed ML & AI capabilities that create measurable business impact.

At the heart of this role is a deep curiosity about how AI and ML can meaningfully improve both customer and associate experiences and Car Max's operational effectiveness. You'll develop and maintain ML models and analytical frameworks that directly influence how customers interact with Car Max — whether through AI-assisted support, intelligent routing, or personalized digital experiences. You'll serve as a subject matter expert on model evaluation, experimental design, and advanced analytics, helping the team and our Product partners make better, faster, evidence-based decisions.

If you're energized by applying ML to real business problems and thrive at the intersection of data science and product partnership, this role is for you.

• Leverage Car Max’s machine learning cloud environment to design & develop algorithms (e.g. statistical models, machine learning, artificial intelligence) that will directly impact critical areas of the Car Max business, including the customer experience
• Partner with software engineers to deploy and maintain algorithms
• Assess performance of production models and identify & act on opportunities for improvement
• Partner with teams across Car Max to explore new use cases for algorithms and bring new customer experiences to life
• Design tests and develop strategies to collect data needed to improve algorithm performance and produce iconic data-driven experiences for Car Max customers

• 1-2 years of experience in the following areas: developing and maintaining ML/AI models in a business setting; evaluating and assessing model performance (of traditional ML algos and/or AI systems); designing and analyzing statistical tests;
  Python, SQL, and other languages appropriate for large scale analysis of numerical and textual data
• Experience in developing or applying knowledge of model interpretability, natural language processing, or large language models is a plus
• Strong verbal and written communication skills with an ability to communicate complex concepts in simple terms & an ability to tie analytic results to business outcomes
• Strong results focus, project management, & teamwork
• Degree in Statistics, Data Science, or a related field

This role will be based out of the Car Max Technology Innovation Center (Richmond, VA) and associates will work onsite 4 days per week.

Work Authorization:
Applicants must be currently authorized to work in the United States on a full-time basis.

Upon an applicant's request, Car Max will consider reasonable accommodation to complete the Car Max Job Application.