Demand Planner

About the role

The Demand Planner develops, maintains, and improves base and consensus demand forecasts in partnership with Sales, Category Management, Finance, Supply Planning, and Operations. This role translates forecast inputs, changes, risks, and opportunities into clear business insights that support decision-making and planning alignment.

Responsibilities

• Develop and maintain demand forecasts using sales, shipment, depletion, consumption, and customer demand data.
• Analyze forecast accuracy, bias, value-add, volatility, and stability; diagnose forecast variances and implement corrective actions.
• Manage DFUs, forecast exceptions, and product lifecycle events, including new product introductions, phase-ins, phase-outs, and discontinuations.
• Challenge forecast assumptions using data and analytics to ensure accurate, unbiased demand plans and prioritize high-impact opportunities through exception-based planning.
• Lead and facilitate IBP demand consensus discussions and align Sales, Category Management, Finance, and Supply Chain to a single forecast.
• Document forecast assumptions, decisions, risks, and opportunities, including volume and revenue impacts.
• Provide analysis, recommendations, and insights to support business and planning decisions.
• Evaluate the impact of planning assumptions on supply execution and escalate potential risks as needed.
• Collaborate with Supply Planning to communicate forecast changes and downstream business impacts.
• Incorporate promotions, events, product launches, discontinuations, market trends, and customer ordering patterns into forecast assumptions.
• Utilize external market data and competitive intelligence to inform forecasts and assess market dynamics.
• Translate commercial strategies into quantified demand impacts and support scenario planning for risks and opportunities.
• Leverage planning, reporting, and business intelligence tools to generate forecasts, analyses, and actionable insights.
• Identify, investigate, and escalate data quality issues that negatively impact forecast performance.
• Build strong cross-functional relationships, align stakeholders on demand drivers and tradeoffs, and translate complex data into clear, actionable business insights.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Supply Chain, Business, Analytics, or related field (or equivalent experience)
• 2–4+ years in demand planning, forecasting, analytics, or market analysis
• IBP / S&OP Experience
• Strongly Preferred: Strong analytical, statistical, and problem-solving skills
• Strong communication and stakeholder management capabilities
• Experience in FMCG / Consumer Products
• Preferred: Experience with Advanced Planning Systems (e.g., Blue Yonder, o9, Kinaxis)
• Exposure to cross-functional supply chain or financial planning processes preferred

Qualifications

• Must be legally authorized to work in the United States without the need for sponsorship.

Skills

• Strong analytical, statistical, and problem-solving skills
• Strong communication and stakeholder management capabilities
• Experience in FMCG / Consumer Products
• Preferred: Experience with Advanced Planning Systems (e.g., Blue Yonder, o9, Kinaxis)
• Exposure to cross-functional supply chain or financial planning processes preferred

Benefits

• Competitive compensation and benefits program with no waiting period – you’re eligible from your first day!
• 401(k) program with 5% employer match and 100% vesting as soon as you enroll.
• Comprehensive paid time off opportunities, including immediate access to four weeks of vacation, five sick days, parental leave and 11 company holidays (including two floating holidays).
• Leaders who are invested in supporting your accelerated career growth, plus paid training, tuition reimbursement and a robust educational platform – DevelopU – with more than 10,000 free courses to support you along the way.
• Inclusive working environment where you can build meaningful work relationships with a diverse group of professionals.
• Take advantage of opportunities to build on our team-oriented culture, such as joining one of our Employee Resource Groups.
• Access to our wellness and employee assistance programs.

Pay

The anticipated compensation for this position ranges from $76,200.00 - 114,200.00 USD annually. This is the lowest to highest salary we in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. An employee’s position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to, specific competencies, relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, seniority, geographic location, performance, shift, travel requirements, sales or revenue-based metrics and business or organizational needs. For certain roles, the successful candidate may be eligible for annual discretionary merit compensation award, bonus and equity pay.

Schedule

This is a full-time, on-site hybrid role on first shift, based in our Oak Brook, IL office.