Job Title: Senior Fabric Developer & Buyer

Reporting to: Collections Director

Location: Hammersmith, London

Role Overview:

Management of purchasing fabric/raw material, managing schedules and delivery, communicating lead times to design, development and production departments, negotiating costs and minimums with suppliers, counter-sourcing when necessary, and overseeing the management of the raw material database.

Responsibilities:

• Working closely with Fabric Team and Design Director to ensure the necessary fabrics for each category are within price range.
• Organising regular fabric, print and colour development meetings with the design and development teams.
• Maintaining fabric boards/ folders in respect to prints and developed textures.
• Attending fabric sourcing appointments in house, at mills and trade fairs.
• Responsible for Price negotiation on printed and developed fabrics and Special Developments.
• Creating a colour palette alongside Design for each season with image research and colour swatches.
• Responsible for incorporating sustainable Qualities into Seasonal Collections.
• Maintain up to date information regarding Stock Fabrics at VBL Warehouse and incorporate into Seasonal Collections allowing for ‘Upcycled’ Portion of Collection.
• Managing all fabric dry-cleaning, shrinking etc.
• Working with Collection Development manager to ensure there is clear communication of quantity of sample cloth and discussions on re orders for duplicate and press samples communicating on any defaults on fabrics and finding solutions for any technical issues for production.
• Responsible for checking the conformity of the fabric rolls ensuring the rolls are labeled accurately and correctly.
• Responsible for managing the fabric charts and coding the fabrics accurately.
• Working on pricing amendments as the collection goes through a last pre show wave of evolution with Collection Development Manager.
• Visiting mills to source relevant qualities needed. The trips should also be used as an opportunity to negotiate further on prices, further strengthen business relationships, check on production.

Administration & Strategy:

• Work in accordance of Seasonal Critical Paths to ensure all deadlines are being considered and ultimately met.
• Responsible for working within the given seasonal budgets and maintaining the Budget Tracker to include all spending.
• Managing the upkeep of fabric, colour and print archives.
• Management of Fabric & Print Qualities on PLM/Zedonk – Responsible for publishing to ERP.
• Responsible for complete Handover of Fabric & Print Collections to Production on a seasonal basis to ensure Production’s requirements.
• Responsible for requesting and recording all Reports and Certificates needed from the Mills for Production (Tech Sheets, REACH, OEKO-TEX).
• Responsible for negotiation of pricing, Lead times for production and development and minimums.
• Managing and overseeing consultant fabric, surface development and carry over fabrics.
• Working with the Design Director and Production manager in terms of fabric qualities and their influence on drops and deliveries.
• Responsible for overseeing the full price structure of fabrics in any one season.

Essential Skills and Requirements:

• Strong creative eye.
• Exceptional applied knowledge and experience with fabrics and print processes.
• Excellent understanding of luxury product and fabrics.
• Ability to maintain strong communicative relationships with suppliers.
• Ability to work to brief whilst adding extra options and alternatives.
• Excellent organisational and problem solving skills
• Ability to work well under pressure, and meet critical deadlines
• Strong analytical skills, with the ability to manage and oversee budgets.

Our mission is to welcome everyone and create an inclusive workforce. We celebrate difference and encourage everyone to join us and be themselves at work. Our decisions respect all people regardless of gender, ethnicity, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation, age, social or political belief, or world view.

Considering the overwhelming response to our current job openings, we wish to inform all potential applicants that positions may close without prior notice due to high demand. To ensure fair consideration and to avoid any disappointment, we strongly encourage interested individuals to submit their applications at the earliest opportunity.