Area Sales Manager
Job Location: Sofia
Company description
Ferrero is a family-owned company with a truly progressive and global outlook and iconic brands such as Nutella®, Tic Tac®, Ferrero Rocher®, Raffaello®, Kinder Bueno® and Kinder Surprise®. As the love for our brands continues to grow, so too does our global reach. Represented in more than 50 countries, with products sold in more than 170, the Ferrero Group is loved by generations around the world. The secret to our global success? 40,000 dedicated employees who celebrate care and quality to craft a business, careers and brands we are proud of. Join us, and you could be one of them.
Diversity Statement
Ferrero is committed to building a diverse and inclusive culture in which all employees feel welcomed and appreciated and have the same opportunities. We believe all of our people are equally talented in their own way. In nurturing the curiosity and natural abilities of our employees, we provide them, generation after generation, the means to succeed personally and professionally, enabling them to craft their journey at Ferrero. The diversity of our talents is what makes our work environment multicultural, innovative and highly rewarding.
About the Role:
As the Area Sales Manager for Bulgaria, you will help increase sales and grow business by supporting the Bulgaria Sales Manager. You’ll work directly with the Field Market Developers and Distributors Teams. You will organize field activities, make sure strategies are followed and help the company expand and strengthen its presence in Bulgaria.
Main Responsibilities:
In this role, you'll lead the Field Market Developers team. You'll organize and guide their activities to meet our company's goals. You'll train and mentor them to understand our business and grow professionally.
You'll plan their routes to make sure they cover all sales areas and store types each month. You'll work with Distributors’ Sales Teams to help grow our business and ensure our sales and merchandising standards are followed.
You'll create detailed sales budgets, divided by month, channel, customer, brand and product. You'll manage promotional activities to align with our goals and make a strong market impact.
Regular store visits will be part of your job. You'll check product placement, shelf space, pricing and freshness of Ferrero products, ensuring our standards are met. You'll work with Marketing and Trade Marketing teams to create and use Point-of-Purchase Materials (POPM) and trade promotions. Using retail research data, you'll find insights to help with strategic decisions and business growth with Local Key Accounts. You'll also suggest ways to grow the local client list.
You'll monitor stock levels and freshness targets for Key Accounts and local clients to meet our quality standards. By tracking competitor activities, you'll gather insights on pricing, placements, promotions and packaging and share these with internal teams to improve our competitive position. You'll supervise the implementation of trade activity plans across Modern Trade and Traditional Trade channels.
Your role will include preparing detailed reports every week and month, divided by channel, client, category, brand and product. You'll create presentations to share progress, insights and recommendations with senior management, ensuring our leadership team is well-informed and aligned with our strategic direction.
Who we are looking for:
To succeed in this role, you will need at least 3 years of experience in a field sales management role, ideally within the FMCG sector, specifically in Modern Trade and/or Traditional Trade. You should have strong leadership and team management skills. You need to be good at data analysis, reporting and creating presentation. The ability to work independently and drive initiatives in a dynamic and competitive market environment is also required. You must be able to manage and prioritize multiple projects within scheduled timelines and have strong communication skills. A very good command of English is necessary, as well as good command in Microsoft Office and a driver’s license (B category).
How to be successful in the role and at Ferrero:
Consumers, quality and care are at the heart of everything we do. So, to be successful at Ferrero, you’ll need to be just as consumer and product centric as we are - dedicated to crafting brilliant results for consumers around the world.
You should be highly focused on the team management, knowing and guiding your people and leading the team towards achieving goals. Thanks to strategic thinking and great understanding of the business environment you will effectively support others, improve processes and manage complexity. Employee contribution and engagement at Ferrero is based on the individual, team and organisation dimension, so demonstrable consumer-focused attitude and autonomy in managing relationships will help you in building your position among stakeholders and achieving expected sales outcomes with your team.