V&C Associates are partnering exclusively with a leading global entertainment, hospitality and lifestyle group to appoint a Managing Director, Retail & Consumer Experiences. This is a senior strategic appointment to lead, structure and scale a pioneering retail and consumer platform at the intersection of music, culture and experiential hospitality. Location requirement will require 1 years secondment in London with a full relocation required to USA.

This division is not traditional merchandise retail. It is an activation led, programmable platform that monetises culture, extends the brand into fans’ daily lives, and creates physical and digital touchpoints that deepen relationships with a global audience. The Managing Director will be responsible for designing, building and running this division as a standalone business within the wider group.

You will hold end to end ownership of the Retail & Consumer Experiences division – strategy, P&L accountability, organisational design, operations, expansion and commercial partnerships – with direct exposure to and interaction with the Group President, senior leadership and the board

Key responsibilities include:

• Building the division: formalising the commercial architecture, establishing the operating model, and standing up a high calibre executive team capable of scaling from three flagship stores to a global network.
• Full P&L ownership: designing and owning a multi stream revenue model where events and activations sit at the core, with product sales, sponsorship, partnerships and experiential premium pricing built on top.
• Cultural programming and fan experience: overseeing the activation calendar across all locations, ensuring stores are conceived as cultural stages that host events, artist appearances, listening experiences and fan community moments.
• Performance management: building the financial planning, forecasting and analytics infrastructure to measure success across seven core dimensions, including financial performance, events and activation's, superfan engagement, brand reach, customer satisfaction, data capture, and collaborations and partnerships.

Expansion strategy: leading market selection, site strategy and real estate negotiations, and developing business cases for new locations, including innovative formats such as pop ups, festival retail and venue integrated commerce.

Key characteristics

• A minimum of 15 years’ progressive leadership experience in lifestyle, experiential or entertainment adjacent retail, including at least 5 years at MD, VP or GM level with full P&L accountability and multi market exposure.
• A proven track record of taking an early stage retail or lifestyle business and building it into a structured, multi market division, including team build out, systems implementation and commercial model development.
• Deep fluency in experiential retail and fan centric brand building, with experience integrating physical and digital experiences into a cohesive platform rather than parallel channels.
• Demonstrable experience designing and scaling activation programming, cultural events and experiential formats that deliver measurable fan engagement and commercial returns.
• International expansion experience across multiple geographies, with a disciplined, data led approach to market selection and capital allocation.

A general management mindset: comfortable owning strategy, operations, finance, people and partnerships concurrently, and operating with pace within a matrixed global organisation.