As home to Matalan's central operations, it's up to our people in Head Office to ensure our stores have everything they need to keep their customers happy - from high quality products at great prices, to cutting-edge support services like HR, Marketing and Finance. In such a fast-moving environment it's important that everyone here has the enthusiasm and vision to keep everything running smoothly.
Whatever stage you're at in your career when you join, show us you've got what it takes and you'll find there are plenty of opportunities to progress to the next level. While the bulk of our Head Office recruitment is into Buying and Merchandising, we do also recruit into other areas of the business, including Customer Services, Store Operations, Design, Marketing, HR and Finance.
Our Buyers are involved in the whole process from initial design through to overseas sourcing and negotiations. Part of our work is about translating designer products onto the high street, so as well as being in touch with what's happening on the catwalk, you need to be capable of disciplined commercial decision-making.
Merchandising works alongside our Buying team to make sure the ranges they work on are successful: analysing previous seasons and reporting on the current season's lines; looking at space planning and generally acting as the Buyer's conscience to make sure the decisions we make together will deliver both volume and profit.
We have Design teams across fashion and homewares who translate requirements from Buying and Merchandising into smart design solutions - taking into account not only price and quality, but also co-ordination with other ranges throughout the store. Design also works closely with Marketing to choose products for photoshoots and mailers.
Our Marketing operation is split into Mailings and Online, Local Marketing, Promotions, PR & Advertising, Print Services and Consumer Insight. The challenges created by online shopping and heavy competition mean that we are always striving to be more creative in the ways we appeal to customers. And as a result there are lots of exciting areas for growth.
As well as a small, generalist HR team looking after the needs of everyone in Head Office, we have a further team of HR and Recruitment professionals working specifically with Retail - providing consultative support to Store Managers on a range of policies and procedures and on specific situations such as disciplinary issues.
It's up to our finance team to understand what's going on across the business and how that affects the bottom line. We tend to recruit into junior levels because we like developing our people and promoting from within. We also encourage people to experience different roles within the department to help them see the bigger picture.
Here we deal with a variety of customer queries in the form of letters, emails and phone calls. We also have a close relationship with stores and other departments, giving them the support they need to solve customer queries and complaints. Ultimately, it's up to us to turn every experience our customers have into a positive one.
This area is basically our stores' presence in Head Office, acting as an interface between stores and the rest of the business. We work hard to stay in touch with all our Store Managers and provide support in a range of areas - handling everything from training and promotions to internal comms and bespoke retail projects.