Production Manager
Wales Bonner are seeking an experienced Production Manager to join our team in London on a full time basis. The role covers the management, planning and execution of production across all product and material categories. On-time deliveries, consistently high product quality, and product margin are the primary KPIs.
Responsibilities:
- Create and maintain the seasonal production critical path, ensuring all deadlines are met.
- Lead production fittings from SMS stage through to PPS and final style approval. Responsible for hiring fit models and freelance garment tech support as required.
- Responsible for accurate production tech packs and BOMs, coordinating with internal and external team as required.
- Work closely with the Product Development team to plan seasonal factory allocations based on technical capability, volume, capacity and margin targets.
- Resourcing of materials and factories in production as and when needed.
- Responsible for the on-time raising of production orders and on-time delivery of stock, identifying and correcting any potential delivery issues as early as possible.
- Raise and follow all production raw material purchase orders, establishing a pre-order system to improve deliveries.
- Develop and maintain exceptionally strong relationships with nominated factories and suppliers, to ensure commercial and technical commitments are honoured.
- Responsible for Quality Control, coordinating inline and end of production QC, either involved directly in person or commissioning external parties as and when required.
- Maintaining and refining the production manual and product portal.
- Creating and course correcting the production budget seasonally, in line with margin targets.
- Maintain the Wales Bonner digital pattern and tech pack archive, as well as supplier and factory databases.
- Ensure factories, mills and suppliers meet all audit requirements and submit compliance documentation regularly.
- Travel to factories as and when required throughout the season.
- Manage and guide junior members of the team, including interns.
- Produce weekly production reports to share with the internal team including sales, logistics, operations and finance.
- Produce an end of season production report, including final margin calculation and factory performance reports.
- Support with ad-hoc projects across the business as required, including special projects and bespoke orders.
Required Skills:
- Extensive experience on Zedonk or similar PLM software.
- Skilled in Microsoft Office / G suite programs, particularly Excel or Sheets.
- Fashion or Textiles degree.
- Italian Speaker preferred.
Ideal Candidate:
- Analytical in approach.
- Positive, can-do attitude.
- Problem solver.
- Strong knowledge of garment and product construction across varied categories.
- Luxury sensibility.
- Interested in sustainability within Fashion.
- Minimum 5 years experience in a similar role.