Choosing, pricing, displaying, and selling the products people buy, in stores and online.
Top pay: highest pay, longest training
E-commerce Director: Runs a company's online store and is responsible for its online sales. Typical pay $150k.
Merchandising Director: Decides what products a retailer sells, how many to buy, and at what price. Typical pay $155k.
Purchasing Manager: Leads the team that buys the products and materials a company needs. Typical pay $140k.
Category Manager: Manages a whole category of products, like all the cereals at a grocery chain, deciding what to stock and how to price it. Typical pay $112k.
Regional Retail Director: Oversees dozens of stores across a region, coaching store managers and owning the sales results. Typical pay $150k.
Mid pay: solid pay, degree or apprenticeship
Retail Buyer: Chooses and buys the products stores sell, from fashion to electronics. Typical pay $73k.
Online Marketplace Manager: Manages a brand's products, ads, and reviews on Amazon, Walmart.com, and other marketplaces. Typical pay $72k.
E-commerce Merchandiser: Decides which products appear where on a shopping website and how they're displayed. Typical pay $70k.
Pricing Analyst: Figures out the best prices for products using data on demand, competitors, and costs. Typical pay $78k.
Merchandise Allocation Planner: Decides how many of each product go to each store so nothing runs out or piles up. Typical pay $70k.
Loss Prevention Manager: Stops theft and fraud in stores and warehouses, from shoplifting rings to employee theft. Typical pay $68k.
Retail Store Manager: Runs a store: hiring, scheduling, sales goals, and customer happiness. Typical pay $62k.
Planogram Analyst: Designs exactly where every product sits on store shelves to boost sales. Typical pay $65k.
Ecommerce Operations Manager: Keeps an online store running smoothly, from listings to shipping to returns. Typical pay $90k.
Fit Model: Tries on clothes before they are made in bulk so designers can check how they fit a real body, measured to a brand's exact size. Typical pay $55k.
Starter: fastest way in
Retail Shift Supervisor: Leads the staff on a store shift, handling problems and keeping things running. Typical pay $50k.
Retail Sales Associate: Helps shoppers find products, answers questions, and makes sales in stores. Typical pay $35k.
Cashier: Rings up purchases, takes payments, and helps customers at checkout. Typical pay $31k.
Personal Shopper / Stylist: Picks out clothes and products for clients based on their style, budget, and needs. Typical pay $42k.
Online Reseller: Buys items cheaply at thrift stores, garage sales, or wholesale and resells them online for profit. Typical pay $30k.
Field Merchandiser: Visits stores for brands to stock shelves, set up displays and make products look good. Typical pay $38k.
Product Catalog Specialist: Loads products onto online stores with the right photos, prices, sizes and descriptions. Typical pay $45k.
Rental Counter Agent: Helps customers rent cars, tools, equipment or tuxedos and checks items in and out. Typical pay $41k.
Assistant Buyer: Helps a retail buyer choose and order the products a store will sell. Typical pay $54k.
Flea Market Vendor: Rents a booth at weekend flea markets and swap meets to sell antiques, tools, clothes or new goods, haggling face to face. Typical pay $30k.
Seasonal Pop-Up Store Manager: Opens, runs and closes a temporary store, like a Halloween costume shop or holiday calendar kiosk, in an empty building for just a few months. Typical pay $22k.
Grocery & Retail Stocker: Unloads deliveries and fills store shelves so products are where shoppers expect them. Typical pay $37k.
Career Universe is an early version. Pay, training and AI-risk figures are estimates to start your own research, not verified facts. The research was written with AI research assistants, checked by validation scripts and spot-checked by hand. Check anything important with schools, employers and official sources. How the numbers work.