Retail Merchandising Consultant

Part-Time Independent Consultant  |  North America  |  Remote

ENGAGEMENT	COMPENSATION	DURATION	POSITIONS
5-10 hours/week	Hourly commensurate with experience.	90-day retainer	2-3 hires

IN EXCHANGE... RELEX WILL TEACH YOU

You bring the merchandising expertise. We give you incredibly valuable AI skills for free. RELEX will teach you how to build autonomous agents and societies of agents that you can introduce into any corporate environment. You'll learn from the industry-leading unified merchandising platform (forecast & replenishment, demand planning, price & promotions, space & assortment, MFP, and store operations in one platform) while gaining hands-on experience with agentic AI, retailer leadership networking, industry podcasts, and thought leadership that will transform your career trajectory.

The Opportunity

RELEX Solutions' Field Innovation VIT Team (Value Engineering, Innovation and Technology) is building an Innovation Incubator, a network of retail practitioners who lead workflow discussions and bring deep thought leadership from firsthand, on-the-job experience. We need people who live (or recently lived) the day-to-day life of a merchandiser at a North American retailer to shape how RELEX builds, demonstrates, and deploys its platform.

As a Retail Merchandising Consultant, you will lead workflow discussions that define modern merchandising operations, from Monday morning meetings to promotional planning to assortment reviews. Your practitioner lens and firsthand experience will directly inform our demo flows, agentic AI workflows, and product marketing for the world's leading retailers.

What You'll Do

Workflow Journeys & Day-in-the-Life Narratives

Lead discussions on the full merchandising lifecycle: weekly cadence meetings, assortment reviews, base pricing, promotional planning & optimization, allocation, and replenishment

Share cross-functional touchpoints: how merchandising interacts with supply chain, store operations, finance, and marketing teams

Whiteboard detailed day-in-the-life narratives for key personas (Category Manager, Demand Planner, Pricing Analyst, Assortment Planner) across Grocery, DIY, and Specialty retail

Identify decision points, data dependencies, and pain points in each workflow that RELEX solutions address

Demo & Agentic Workflow Input

Validate demo scenarios against real-world practice: are the storylines, data volumes, and decision sequences realistic?

Provide scenario briefs with realistic data stories for presales demonstrations

Inform agentic AI workflow design by describing how practitioners actually make decisions, what triggers actions, and where automation would add the most value

Review and stress-test new product features from a practitioner perspective before customer-facing launches

Optional: Thought Leadership & Industry Engagement

Co-author blog posts, white papers, and industry articles drawing on your hands-on merchandising experience

Participate in podcast episodes and webinars as a practitioner voice alongside RELEX product and strategy leaders

Attend and contribute to retailer networking events, building your professional network alongside RELEX's customer and prospect communities

Contribute to RELEX's emerging thought leadership on agentic retail operations

Segment Focus Areas

GROCERY	DIY / HOME IMPROVEMENT	SPECIALTY RETAIL
Fresh & perishables Promotional optimization Weekly ad planning Vendor collaboration Planogram execution	Seasonal planning Assortment localization Space optimization Project/event buys Pro vs. consumer mix	Long-tail assortment Allocation & transfers MFP integration Markdown cadence Lifecycle pricing

Who You Are

Required

5+ years of hands-on merchandising experience at a North American retailer (Grocery, DIY/Home Improvement, or Specialty)

Currently active in a retail merchandising role OR recently transitioned (within last 1-2 years) from a retail operator position

Deep working knowledge of at least 3 of: demand planning, replenishment, assortment planning, pricing, promotional optimization, allocation, or space management

Ability to articulate complex workflows clearly. You can explain how a Monday morning meeting actually works to someone who's never sat in one

Comfort with ambiguity and self-direction. This is a part-time, remote engagement where you'll set your own pace within sprint priorities

Preferred

Experience with planning/optimization platforms (RELEX, Blue Yonder, Oracle Retail, SAP F&R, Infor, or similar)

Interest in AI/ML applications to retail. You don't need to build models, but you should be curious about how agentic AI could transform the workflows you know

Content creation experience: blogging, presenting at industry events, or contributing to trade publications

Cross-functional experience spanning both merchandising and supply chain or store operations

Category management experience across multiple departments or divisions