Retail Development Manager 
Circa £50,000 plus benefits, including a company car and private healthcare (Work Level 5)  
Field-based across the surrounding areas of London, this role you’ll work in a hybrid way splitting your time between working from home and travelling to stores across your area (find out more about our hybrid working policy at jobs.coop.co.uk/hybrid-working-policy). 

Please note this is a field-based role with travel to store sites across your assigned area. A full UK driving licence is required.

We’re looking for a Retail Development Manager to join Co-op Wholesale. Since 1977, we’ve championed independent retailers to thrive with Nisa – and now, we’re entering a bold new chapter as Co-op Wholesale. It’s the same spirit, with bigger ambition: bringing the power of Co-op to more local businesses than ever. And with that, exciting opportunities are on the rise, like this one.

In this role, you’ll manage a portfolio of roughly 30 stores, ensuring they maximise the value of their partnership with us while consistently delivering on all agreed contractual commitments. Alongside this, you’ll be supporting at an operational level with the central teams and driving sales opportunities at a local level.

As the face of the Co-op Wholesale business, your retailers will look to you for advice and support. You’ll need great communication skills, and knowledge and experience of food retail. In return, we can offer you a fantastic opportunity to build your networks, learn all about the industry, and really make an impact across our Co-op wholesale network.

What you’ll do

• Drive sales by building positive relationships, helping your retailers to realise their potential and any developing opportunities for growth
• Create the best experiences for your retailers, finding the root cause to any problems they may face in our stores 
• Manage your own schedule, visiting convenience retailers across your region
• Work closely with your retailers, challenging and educating them when necessary to develop productive relationships
• Take responsibility for driving your own performance and delivering KPIs
• Act as the interface between the head office and retailers; working closely with IT, logistics, and operational teams to resolve issues and queries

This role would suit people who have

• Proven track record of driving commercial success in Field Sales/Convenience/FMCG sales, with a strong ability to build and nurture strategic partnerships, and collaborate with key stakeholders to optimise revenue and market growth.
• Excellent communication skills
• Excellent organisation and time management skills, with the ability to manage their workload effectively
• Strong IT skills with the ability to use Microsoft PowerPoint and Excel confidently

Why Co-op? 

If you have the skills that we need, we can offer you a competitive salary and great benefits package which includes 30% off Co-op branded products in our food stores (as well as other discounts on Co-op products and services).

• An annual bonus (based on personal and business performance)
• 28 days holiday (rising to 32 with service) plus bank holidays 
• A pension with up to 10% employer contributions
• Private healthcare 
• Access to a subsidised onsite gym (at our Manchester HQ)
• Coaching and training to support your career development
• Wagestream app – giving you access to a percentage of your pay as you earn

Building a diverse environment

We’re actively building diverse teams and we welcome applications from everyone. If you have a disability, we can make reasonable adjustments to our recruitment process according to your needs. We're also part of the Disability Confident scheme, meaning we'll always offer an interview to disabled candidates who apply through the scheme if they meet the minimum criteria for a job.

We'll ask whether you’d like to be considered under the Disability Confident scheme when you apply.

If we invite you to take part in the recruitment process for any of our jobs, we’ll ask you if you need any reasonable adjustments to enable you to participate.

You can find out more about our recruitment process at jobs.coop.co.uk/apply-process

You can find out more about the Disability Confident scheme and all our commitments to diversity and inclusion at jobs.coop.co.uk/diversity-inclusion-wellbeing

Please note that we may close applications for this role early. 

As part of your application, you'll need to complete an online assessment. This assessment typically takes between 45-60 minutes.