The Company

Founded in 1856, Hunter is a progressive British heritage brand renowned for its iconic Original boot. With a team of over 200 people, global e-commerce sites, headquarters in London and offices in Edinburgh, New York, Düsseldorf and Tokyo, the brand builds on its heritage of over 160 years, creating footwear and outerwear to protect from the weather and perform across all terrains.

In 2011, UK-based Searchlight Capital Partners L.P. became majority shareholders in the company, signaling the start of a new path for the brand. Alasdhair Willis was appointed Creative Director in 2013 and two new brand categories, Hunter Original and Hunter Field, were introduced. CFO Benedict Smith joined in July 2015 from Game Digital, and February 2016 saw the announcement of Vincent Wauters as Hunter’s Chief Executive Officer. Vincent joined Hunter from Arc’teryx, where he was President of the premium outdoor and lifestyle brand.

Background to the Current Opportunity

This is an exciting time for Hunter Boots as the company continues to implement a strategy to deliver year on year top line growth. Revenue has grown t to £101.6m in 2016,up from £95.7m in 2014, off the back of a significant increase in North America sales. The owners, Searchlight Capital Partners, have invested significantly to support the brand’s flagship stores in London and Tokyo, the opening of a new outlet store at Bicester Village, an increased presence on the high street, upscaling warehousing and distribution, and the development of a global e-commerce platform and IT system. The group has also put a particular focus on growing the Hunter team, building for the future by promoting from within and investing in new talent.

With a focus on improving support to the Operations teams, a new role of Global FP&A Inventory & Production Analyst has been created which will be a pivotal role within the organisation. This position will a key business partner to the Operations and Merchandising teams. A critical part of the role will be providing independent analytical review of stock buys placed, seasonality and ageing of global stock holdings and working closely with the teams to identify and mitigate risks to the business. In what will be a varied and fast moving role, this opportunity requires an individual with first class commercial acumen, a ‘can do’ attitude, and strong attention to detail. This is an exceptional opportunity to join one of Scotland’s most iconic businesses and contribute to its future success, playing a key role in its journey.

Preferred Candidate Background

The position requires a professionally qualified accountant who possesses strong business partnering skills and an excellent analytical approach to help convey commercial information in a meaningful way that will aid decision making. The successful candidate will also be adept at presenting to a wide variety of stakeholders at all levels and will have strong influencing abilities when it comes to pointing out both opportunities and risks. It is likely that the individual will be working in a similar role within industry and have gained the skills required to perform in the role however, they may have also qualified within practice and are working within a commercial finance remit where their skill set is focused more towards an analytical role within a business.

Given the interface with senior stakeholders, it is critical that the candidate possesses sufficient credibility and confidence when presenting analysis. As the group continues to experience significant growth, the role requires an individual who is flexible, robust, and able to work on a variety of projects as they present themselves.

A summary of the key candidate requirements are as follows:

• Qualified Accountant
• The capacity to interpret complex financial information
• Confident communicator with excellent interpersonal skills
• Strong analytical skills and technical ability
• High degree of accuracy and attention to detail
• First class problem solving and decision making
• Able to perform in a dynamic working environment
• Self-motivated and capable of developing in the current role over time
• Proficient in excel (vlookups, sumif, pivot tables etc)
• Ability to work under pressure and in an environment with constant change

Job Description

Reporting directly to the Commercial Finance Manager (based in London), the successful candidate will be responsible for the following:

Buy Analysis

• Review monthly Buy requirements by territory by channel by category and provide prior period reconciliations, highlighting key movements with reporting
• Analyse risk of each buy for the period and cumulatively
• Implement robust comparison of buy to the trading forecasts and top 20 B2B forecast
• Develop a transparent cashflow projection from the agreed buy

Planning & Production

• Provide variance analysis on monthly actual purchases vs approved buys by category
• Create and implement a rolling forecast on stock purchase orders placed, highlighting key variances to approved buy and to forecast cashflows
• Develop and implement robust methodology for analysing actual landed costs vs range plan landed costs, highlighting variances by territory re FOB, freight and duty
• Create transparent projection of PPV (Purchase price variance) values by territory
• Review and improve transfer pricing mechanisms and operations
• Oversee stock invoicing across the group and ensure that it is timely and accurate
• Quantify the EBITDA effect of dropping styles from the range plan during the planning process
• Support the organisation with any planned DC moves, physically or systematicallyStock
• Provide accurate and timely analysis on stock seasonality by physical and virtual DC both in volume and value terms
• Assist in the monthly calculation of stock provisioning by season by category
• Ensure that stock end of life policy and procedures are fully understood by the global organisation and are being adhered to
• Review and challenge proposals in maximising the return on stock

Forecasting and Budgeting

• Be responsible for providing sufficient gross intake margin information at category, gender and segment level to facilitate margin forecasting by territory and by channel
• Support Operations teams in preparing opex and capex related budgets and forecasts
• Create and implement a robust process for providing global working capital and cashflow information to Group Finance, highlighting risks and providing reconciliations to previous plans

Month-End

• Provide accurate and timely cost centre reports to budget holders, ensuring variances vs latest plans are clearly explained and action plans in place to mitigate overspends
• Ensure that capex related costs have been correctly identified

Relationship building

• Build sustainable relationships with Global Operations and Merchandising teams by: - creating self-serve system reports on historic and future orders, sales and purchases - highlighting any margin gaps, with recommendations for minimising risk.
• Support teams with scenario modelling for cost price/product initiatives; ensure that Supply Chain, Commercial and Marketing objectives are aligned.
• Ad hoc reporting

Salary: c£40,000 per annum (depending on experience) + a great host of benefits

For more information please contact out retained advisor, Daryl Harper at Rutherford Cross on 0131 603 8111. Please note, any direct or 3rd party applications will be forwarded to Rutherford Cross for assessment.