Buyer/Planner

Founded in Japan in 1887, Kao is passionate about making a difference in people's lives with our high quality products and services to create a Kirei Life for all - a beautiful life that respects the needs of our consumers and customers as well as the planet. We never compromise on quality and craft our products with care for the consumer and the environment.

As a company driven by purpose and strong corporate values we pride ourselves to be listed among the World's Most Ethical Companies since 16 consecutive years. Our corporate philosophy, the Kao Way, guides us in everything we do - acting with integrity, courageously driving innovation and treating each other with trust and respect.

The Buyer/Planner orders raw/packaging materials to support finished good production at Kao plants or Contract Manufacturers, and creating finished good production plans for products produced at Contract Manufacturers. Reporting to the Demand and Supply Planning Manager, your primary goals will include optimizing inventory, ensuring high customer order fill rate, minimizing obsolete and slow moving, and ensuring cohesive and collaborative internal and external partnerships.

At Kao, we offer amazing benefits that are available to you on your first day of employment (healthcare, 401(k) plus company match), 36 total days off (vacation + holidays + sick) and a reasonable salary range of $60,000 - $75,000. We also offer a hybrid work schedule.

What you will do:

• Develop daily, weekly, or monthly ordering plans by reviewing forecast streams, demands for promotions, production schedules, and inventory positions at the SKU level. Balance orders against vendor capability and optimize inventory to support KPTs (Key performance targets).
• Place and monitor purchase orders to support production plans with consideration to minimum order requirements, lead times, cost effectiveness, batch splits, seasonality, and any upcoming restages, product changes and new product launches.
• Contribute to cross functional teams, including NPD (new product development), Consensus/Forecasting, Obsolete, Critical Sku Information reviews, Scheduling meetings, and others.
• Identify potential stock issues and communicate to cross functional groups to support effective prioritization and decision making in production scheduling or customer order fulfillment.
• Identify potential slow-moving or obsolete inventory and communicate to drive disposition and appropriate decision-making. Prevent and minimize by facilitating cross functional discussions.
• Lead vendor calls, supporting partnerships with domestic and international suppliers and affiliates.
• Track performance against Key Performance Targets (KPTs) and other objectives. This includes creating, updating, and distributing reports from SAP, Excel, BI, Word, and PowerPoint.
• Support Supply Chain special projects.

What you will need:

• Bachelor's Degree in Operations or Supply Chain Management.
• 1+ years of experience in Supply Chain or Operations using an ERP/MRP system.
• Service oriented and customer-focused ; collaborative partnerships
• Communicates clearly, with credibility and confidence.

What we offer: A friendly and flexible work environment with great compensation packages, benefits package, ongoing development and the opportunity to enhance your skills and deliver tangible results. At Kao your voice will be heard. Your opinion really counts. We believe that change comes from taking opportunities into your own hands, so we value and reward thinking and new ideas.

Hiring Process: Kao embraces the diversity and the individual personalities of its people because we believe it is diversity that makes us strong. This is why we welcome applications from all areas of the global community.

Want to learn more: If you feel you are as unique as our products and want to find out why 33,000 people across the globe opted for a career with us please visit our Americas website (https://www.kao.com/americas/en/).

Kao USA is an equal opportunity employer, including disability/vets.

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