Summary
A prestigious and rapidly growing luxury brand is seeking a Vice President of Retail to lead the next phase of its omnichannel retail expansion. This executive will assume full P&L ownership of the brand's retail ecosystem, which currently includes three flagship locations across the United States and Europe, a high-touch digital selling team, and a dynamic traveling pop-up program. Reporting directly to the CEO, the VP of Retail will serve as the architect of an ambitious multi-year growth strategy with the mandate to open several new stores per year over the next five years. The ideal candidate is a seasoned retail leader who has scaled a boutique or luxury retail footprint from a handful of doors into a meaningful global network — someone who thrives at the intersection of brand storytelling, operational excellence, and commercial performance.
Responsibilities
Retail Strategy & Expansion
- Develop and execute a comprehensive multi-year retail expansion roadmap, targeting the opening of several new stores annually across key domestic and international markets over a five-year horizon.
- Lead all aspects of new store development including market analysis, site selection, lease negotiation, design oversight, buildout management, and launch planning.
- Define and evolve the brand's retail concept to ensure each location delivers a distinctive, immersive client experience consistent with the brand's luxury positioning.
- Establish scalable frameworks for store operations, staffing models, visual merchandising standards, and local marketing activations that can be replicated across new markets.
Omnichannel & Digital Selling
- Oversee the digital selling team, ensuring alignment between in-store and remote client engagement strategies to deliver a seamless, high-touch omnichannel experience.
- Drive clienteling initiatives and CRM adoption across all retail touchpoints, leveraging data and client insights to deepen relationships and increase lifetime value.
- Collaborate with e-commerce and marketing leadership to create a unified brand experience across physical and digital channels.
Pop-Up Program
- Direct the strategy and execution of the brand's traveling pop-up program, using temporary retail activations as both a revenue driver and a market-testing tool to inform permanent store placement decisions.
- Identify high-impact event, wholesale, and cultural partnerships that extend the brand's physical presence into new audiences and geographies.
Team Leadership & Talent Development
- Build, mentor, and lead a best-in-class retail organization across all existing and future locations, the digital selling team, and the pop-up program.
- Establish a talent pipeline and succession planning framework to support rapid organizational growth, recruiting and developing store directors, regional leaders, and field support functions.
- Foster a performance-driven culture rooted in hospitality, brand values, and accountability.
Operations & Financial Management
- Own the full retail P&L, setting and delivering against revenue, margin, and profitability targets across all channels and locations.
- Develop and manage annual operating and capital expenditure budgets for the retail division, partnering with Finance on forecasting, scenario planning, and ROI analysis for new store investments.
- Implement and continuously refine retail KPIs, reporting cadences, and operational playbooks to ensure consistency and excellence as the footprint scales.
- Oversee inventory planning and allocation in partnership with merchandising and supply chain teams to optimize sell-through and minimize liability across a growing store network.
Cross-Functional Partnership
- Serve as a key member of the senior leadership team, contributing to overall brand strategy and company-wide decision-making.
- Partner closely with the CEO, Creative, Marketing, Merchandising, and Finance teams to ensure retail priorities are fully integrated with broader business objectives.
- Represent the voice of the retail client within the organization, surfacing insights that inform product development, assortment strategy, and brand positioning.
Requirements
Experience
- 12–15+ years of progressive retail leadership experience within luxury fashion, fine jewelry, or a comparable high-touch luxury category.
- Demonstrated track record of scaling a retail footprint — ideally from a small base of stores to a significantly larger network — including hands-on experience with new market entry, store openings, and international expansion.
- Proven P&L management experience at the division or business-unit level, with a strong command of retail economics, four-wall profitability, and capital deployment.
- Meaningful experience managing omnichannel retail operations, including digital selling or clienteling programs alongside traditional brick-and-mortar.
- Prior experience reporting to or partnering directly with a founder, CEO, or C-suite in an entrepreneurial, high-growth environment.
Skills & Competencies
- Strategic thinker with the ability to translate a long-range vision into actionable, milestone-driven execution plans.
- Exceptional leadership and talent development capabilities, with experience building retail teams from the ground up during periods of rapid growth.
- Strong financial and analytical acumen, comfortable building business cases, modeling store-level economics, and presenting investment recommendations to senior stakeholders.
- Deep expertise in luxury retail operations, client experience design, and brand-right visual merchandising.
- Outstanding communicator and collaborator with the executive presence to influence cross-functional partners and represent the brand externally.
- Highly adaptable and comfortable operating in a fast-paced, founder-led environment where resourcefulness and hands-on engagement are valued alongside strategic leadership.
Additional Qualifications
- Willingness to travel domestically and internationally up to 40–50% of the time to support existing locations, new store openings, pop-up activations, and market visits.
- Existing relationships within the luxury real estate and retail brokerage community are a strong plus.
- Multilingual ability or international market fluency is a plus given the brand's global retail presence.
