Key Account Manager (Costco)

Benefits/Perks for US Office/Remote Employees (2024)

• Paid Time Off: 17 days PTO + 3 sick/personal days; 12 holidays; 8 hours Volunteer Time Off; 2 weeks parental leave (new parents within 6 months of the birth or adoption of a child, after 2 months of employment). Finished your 40 hours? At 2:00 on Friday, leave for the weekend!
• Tuition Reimbursement after 6 months of employment
• Referral Bonus
• 401(k): We match 100% of the first 3% you contribute, and 50% of the next 2%. You are always 100% vested in all contributions to the plan.
• Employee Assistance Program (EAP): Call the EAP 24/7 for confidential assistance with nearly any personal matter you may be experiencing. You and your family have access to five free consultations with a licensed clinician per issue per calendar year. Financial & legal counseling is also available free of charge.
• Insurance Summary (FTE 30+ hours/week): Medical 4 plan options through Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois (BCBS); Dental Low or High PPO options through BCBS; Vision contributions covered by the company with coverage through BCBS; Flexible spending accounts for health and dependent care (HSA for high deductible plan); Basic life and accidental death and dismemberment (AD&D) at 2.5x your annual earnings; Short & long-term disability if you have a qualified disability due to accident or illness & first 4 weeks of STD paid at 100%; MDLIVE 24/7, on-demand, virtual visits with a board-certified doctor or nurse practitioner for minor illnesses, as well as board-certified psychiatrists, psychologists, and other licensed clinician; Health Advocate to assist with enrollment questions, complex conditions, find specialists, address eldercare issues, clarify insurance coverage, work on claim denials, and help negotiate fees for non-covered services.

Conceptualize, develop, plan, and execute a comprehensive business strategy that drives customer solutions. Collaborate with Trade Marketing to help support the development of customer marketing efforts that help to build the O-Cedar brand in the US market. Research, learn, and develop a strong understanding of your customer set and the business, industry, economic model, organizational trends, and customer needs. Partner with cross functional teams including Business Intelligence, Marketing, and Procurement to help maximize category potential and overall market share for your given customer set. Gain an understanding of and own the Trade Budget Management process (TBM) and own the customer P&L.

Responsibilities:

• Assist the US SVP of Sales in developing the strategic agenda for FHCS with key accounts; drive channel strategies for US marketplace.
• Act as key point of contact for Costco buyers; facilitating line reviews, negotiations, and driving promotional opportunities. Act as key point of contact for additional retailers as directed by the SVP of Sales.
• Build P&L models for current and new business to help guide business decisions. Analyze and present recommendations internally and externally.
• Forecast sales on a weekly/monthly basis. Build annual operating plans and communicate forecast changes as needed.
• Help coordinate with Trade Marketing; promotional development and execution of customer sales initiatives.
• Monitor and report out on our top priority product performances across the retailers and provide updates internally and externally.
• Leverage syndicated data, competitive intelligence, and macro consumer trends to best position O-Cedar in the marketplace and to understand the effectiveness of promotions.
• Develop and maintain ongoing marketplace and competitive audits for your customer set, including product assortment, placement, pricing, and promotional activity.
• Other duties as assigned by your manager.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration, Sales, or Marketing a plus.
• 5+ years of experience in Sales, Trade Marketing, Shopper Marketing, Retail Buying, or Category Management preferred.
• Must have either worked for or called on Costco, or have relevant experience within CPG.
• Experience with IRI or syndicated data analysis preferred. Analytical skills and fluent abilities to work with data in Excel (MS Access a plus).
• Strong interpersonal skills and ability to work across multiple levels of the organization, with a demonstrated ability to manage cross functional teams. Excellent business communication skills, written and oral.
• Project management skills with ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously. Strong planning and organizational skills.
• Although we are based in Aurora, IL, this role is fully remote and can reside anywhere in the US from a home office, as long as you are okay with travel to Aurora, IL, and Seattle, WA (anticipated travel to Seattle ~20%).

Freudenberg Household Products (FHP) is the consumer products and professional cleaning product division of the Freudenberg Group – a multi-billion dollar, multi-national, privately held organization headquartered in Germany. The Freudenberg Group employs some 50,000 people in 60 countries worldwide and generates sales of over 10 billion euros. Freudenberg has businesses in the automotive, medical device, battery and fuel cell division and focuses on continuously developing new technology in every sector.

In some parts of the world, our division is known as Freudenberg Home and Cleaning Solutions (FHCS) and has individual operating companies in many countries, employing more than 3,200 people and hosting a distribution network in 35 countries. Our vision, making our world cleaner, includes a mission of providing superior home and cleaning products that are built to last for consumer households and professional cleaners.

O-Cedar is the well-established brand of FHCS in the United States. The products have more than 115 years of history in the US market and O-Cedar is the number one brand in the durable floor cleaning category in the US. O-Cedar products can be found in many retailers such as Walmart, Target, Home Depot, Costco and Amazon. In Canada, the brand is known as Vileda. It is the strength of our leading brands such as Vileda and O-Cedar that we continuously reinvent our solutions to make the consumers’ lives easier.

Our Vileda Professional team develops and manufactures leading edge cleaning solutions for professional users in various application areas, such as Healthcare, Controlled Environment, and General Building Cleaning. With over 50 years in the business, we know what needs professional users in different environments have. We offer solutions that help them to clean faster, more effectively, and at lower total costs. Based on sustainability principles, innovation in cleaning has always been a main focus in the daily work of Vileda Professional.

One of our core values is embracing a culture of diversity and inclusion. Our most important asset is our people, of all ages and genders, with their different cultural backgrounds and talents. Promoting our employees and inspiring them to take on the multifaceted tasks at Freudenberg in the long-term – this is the key to our success. We are devoted to our employees’ well-being and personal development. We embrace all forms of diversity and inclusion and show understanding and respect in our dealings with each other. We promote a multi-cultural environment where employees work together in worldwide teams to reach their full potential and enrich our culture. Our goal is and will always be to mirror this diverse and inclusive culture in our organization.

#LI-MN