Gary Beckerman

gbeckerman@sdretail.com

Background

Gary has over 30 years of experience in the retail industry and consulting/advisory sector. He brings a unique background and blend of merchandising and operational support, central and store merchandising, product development and global sourcing, plus marketing experience.  He once served as Operating Vice President reporting to the Chairman and CEO of the 4th largest discount retail chain in the . with annual sales of $3.5 billion. Having functioned in both corporate and division positions, he has a varied background with keen understanding of issues related to revenue and margin, central merchandising, product design, development and sourcing, inventory management (financial & flow, including store processing) and operating income.

Gary is responsible for and involved in a wide range of consulting/advisory assignments covering strategy assessment, supply chain, store operations, organization and process redesign, marketing and home office productivity improvement.

Prior to joining SD Retail (formerly Senn Delaney,) Gary was employed by KPMG LLP, BearingPoint, Inc., and Andersen Business Consulting as a Director and project leader. He was also employed by large retail corporations over 22 years with the May Department Stores Inc., Caldor Corporation, in both headquarter and store positions. Gary holds a Bachelors degree from the State University of New York at Buffalo .

Relevant Experience

·         Managed integrated planning project (current state analysis and future state design, organization design and roles/responsibility development and roadmap development) for a Fortune 50 U.S. Department Store’s merchandise planning group – pre-season and in-season process design and management.

·         Managed and implemented numerous projects involving: 1) strengthening the operational structure and processes for two major U.S. department stores’, one major international departments store’s Product Development, Sourcing and International Buying Office divisions, 2) a major category specialty retailer’s functional process design, training and deployment for product concept, development and sourcing, and 3) redesigning the merchandise supply chain processes for the largest ready-to-wear catalog retailer in the U.S. The objective was to identify areas of opportunity to improve both organization and process efficiency, and communication within/between the headquarters and its international offices and manufacturing partners. In the final analysis he identified the organization and process improvement opportunities, technology recommendations, along with the associated payroll and non-payroll cost reductions.

·         Participated in and managed numerous home office productivity engagements (major US home improvement company, U.S. departments store and international specialty athletic apparel/shoe company) in business development strategy, integrated planning, merchandising, sales promotion, circulation and product development/global sourcing for numerous retailers, resulting in 25 to 75% improvement beyond the projects ROI objectives.

·         Managed pricing elasticity analysis and implementation projects; analyzed weekly and peak-seasonal promotion performance by SKUs within key sub-categories, and constructed high-level pricing elasticity indexes for assigned sub-categories based on the company's actual scan data to determine which weekly promotional pricing tactics would increase total revenue and margin performance.

·         Developed the functional requirements and design of reports for a major German discount department store, enabling the merchandising, allocation and replenishment group to effectively manage the business for all time periods.  

·         An area of expertise on the support side include the development and facilitation of corporate strategic planning, the creation of standard merchandising business planning processes and was directly responsible for the merchants’ seasonal financial plans (basis for development of the operating plan), Open-to-Buy maintenance and reporting.  In addition, he managed the research department for merchandising, sales promotion effectiveness and stores. 

·         As a member of the Executive Review Committee for a year 2000 systems conversion project, he helped focus decisions on the timely execution of the new software installation and roll-out for planning seasonal assortments, ladder and allocation planning. In addition, together with the Finance division, the merchant planning process successfully became the basis for the growth and development of the company’s operating and bank plan.

·         He created and developed, with MIS programming support, a company wide seasonal markdown cadence with a corresponding aged inventory on line report structure. Successfully reducing average inventory by $100 million at cost over 2 years.

Experience includes many positions at May Department Stores, Inc. (a $15 Billion department store corporation), as Vice President Divisional Merchandise Manager in both Softlines and Hardlines, Marketing VP, Corporate Research Director and Branch Department Store Divisional Manager for its’ Washington D.C. flagship store. As a central merchant, he sourced and explored both the domestic and Far East markets to develop private label programs along with May Department Store’s product development office.

The Retail industry functional areas in which Gary has significant experience include Merchandising, Merchandising Support, Product Development, Merchant Financial Planning, Integrated Planning, Research and Analysis, Operational Support and Marketing.

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