Demand Planner

The Demand Planner is responsible for creating, monitoring, analysing and improving the demand forecast for both the short and long term for the relevant market(s) for various product types, brands and channels. The Demand Planner works closely with the sales, purchasing, pricing and supply chain (operations) teams.

The Demand Planner ensures a smooth monthly demand forecast process, and is (also jointly) responsible for monitoring the forecast accuracy & bias with sales, and is constantly looking for solutions and tools to improve the accuracy of the planning with sales, supply chain and operations.

Demand planning is a key role in the S&OP process, as the forecast it delivers will enable operations to meet the production targets timely, efficient, and cost effective. The Demand Planner combines a variety of information from sales, supply chain / procurement, operations (timely, as accurate as possible, usable in qualitative and quantitative terms) in order to properly forecast the products that need to be produced. The Demand Planner delivers an important piece of information for the S&OP process, ensuring that demand is properly planned.

The Demand Planner role has typically a planning horizon of 1 to 18 months on monthly buckets and 3 months on weekly buckets. The level of the role depends on the scope and complexity, based on the number of customers and size & complexity of the product portfolio.

The Demand Planner works closely with the Supply Planner and the Production Planner / Scheduler. Depending on the size of the organization, these 3 planning roles may be combined into one or two roles, merging the responsibilities of supply and demand planning, and / or scheduling.

Job Description :

• Forecasting: Prepares as accurate as possible the demand forecast for all products with a horizon of 18 months in close cooperation with the stakeholders that contribute to this process (Sales, Operations, Supply Chain), by gathering and analysing data, applying statistical modelling and reviewing and validating the results, in order to deliver a reliable forecast as part of the S&OP process.
• Maintain demand planning master data and systems and software, maintains relevant data and monitors / analyses trends.
• Prepares and monitors the KPIs for forecast accuracy and bias.
• Data and information gathering: Collects timely the right input / data and information from sales (and marketing) about seasonal effects, sales plans, promotions, market trends, distribution changes, tenders, product introductions and product terminations in order to combine all relevant information into the forecast.
• Identifies variances based upon historical production performance and expected future activities of products, and planning inventory needs for future demand.
• Identifies relevant market-related data and competitive intelligence that is relevant for the demand forecasting process.
• Identify sales opportunities and risks and propose push sales on available capacities and RM.
• Collaborative planning: Prepares relevant material to facilitate discussion and facilitates / manages the monthly demand meeting, in which the input from sales & marketing is discussed beforehand.
• Achieves consensus for operational demand forecasts by facilitating a collaborative planning process with sales & marketing.
• Get input from Customer service teams when required.
• Collaborate with key customers planning teams to tend to collaborative and integrated planning.
• Stock control: Timely informs stakeholders when stock levels, outbound deliveries and / or customer service are at risk.
• Contributes to an optimal balance between production and stock orders.
• Continuous improvement: Proposes improvements to the forecasting process and putting it into practice.
• Projects: Participates in various projects with the aim of improving the forecast reliability and / or the forecasting process.

Our organisation:

Skretting is a global leader in providing innovative and sustainable nutritional solutions and services for the aquaculture industry. Skretting has production facilities in 18 countries on five continents to manufacture and deliver high quality feeds from hatching to harvest for more than 60 species. The total annual production volume of feed is close to 2.5 million tonnes. Our mission is Feeding the Future.

Equal Opportunity Employer:

Skretting is an equal opportunity employer; applicants are considered for all roles without regard to race, color, religious creed, sex, national origin, citizenship status, age, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation, marital, parental, military status or any other status protected by applicable local law. Please advise us at any point during the recruitment and selection process if you require accommodation. Skretting is committed to compliance with all applicable legislation, including providing accommodation for applicants with disabilities.