Media & Music
Our client is an entertainment company built around artists and their fans. It’s a one-stop shop for content production and fan engagement, and it’s growing fast. Working for some of the most iconic names in music, it leverages IP to drive maximum commercial value. The group creates award winning content, runs a variety of audience management platforms and creates high quality official merchandise.
The Role
This is a standout opportunity for an ambitious finance professional who wants more than a back-office seat. In this newly created Project Accountant role, you’ll own the true cost of what the business sells and makes, from a range of media content, to digital platforms, and across merchandise and e-commerce. You’ll give the Senior Leadership Team a clear view of the margins earned by every part of the Group. You’ll be a trusted commercial partner as well as a number-cruncher. As a trusted commercial partner, the Finance Director and wider leadership will rely on your analysis to price products, control spend and protect margin.
What you’ll be doing:
- Producing product, artist, and channel margin analysis to support pricing, range planning and supplier decisions.
- Building and maintaining standard and actual costs for merchandise, covering all aspects of production, supply chain and artist royalties.
- Explaining purchase price, usage and fulfilment cost variances, finding the root causes and recommending what should change.
- Tracking production costs against approved budgets for media content creation, preparing cost reports and cost-to-complete forecasts with production teams.
- Working with the FP&A team to model new artist partnerships, product launches, suppliers and fulfilment arrangements before they are agreed.
- Valuing stock in line with FRS 102 Section 13, and maintaining provisions for excess, obsolete and slow-moving stock, including end-of-tour and end-of-campaign merchandise.
- Preparing monthly cost of sales and stock reconciliations between the e-commerce platforms, fulfilment partners and the ledger.
- Providing cost inputs to the annual budget and rolling forecasts, including the effect of currency movements.
- Documenting costing policies, strengthening internal controls, and finding ways to automate costing and reporting.
- Working with international accounting colleagues to share best practice, improve international policies, and spot cross-group opportunities to improve margins through group purchasing and other synergies.
About You
For this Project Accountant role, you’ll be analytical, curious, and commercially switched on. You don’t just report a variance; you explain what caused it and what should change. You’re comfortable running the monthly costing cycle independently, and you know when to flag something upwards.
Required experience and skills:
- Professional accounting qualification, e.g. ACA, ACCA or CIMA.
- Proven experience in cost accounting in a retail, e-commerce, consumer products, manufacturing or other stock-holding business.
- Sound working knowledge of FRS 102, particularly Section 13, and awareness of IAS 2.
- Hands-on experience with standard and absorption costing, variance analysis and stock valuation methods.
- A practical understanding of customs duty and import VAT affect imported goods.
- Experience working with stock data from e-commerce platforms such as Shopify.
- Advanced Excel skills, including lookups, pivot tables and multi-tab cost models.
- Confidence working with non-finance colleagues, suppliers and fulfilment partners, and explaining cost drivers clearly.
- An accurate, well-organised approach, with stock valuations and provisions that stand up to audit.
- A real understanding of how duty, freight, royalties and exchange rates affect margin.
- Initiative, and a genuine commitment to the company’s vision.
- A background in media, music or merchandise, or a genuine love of music and media and a clear desire to work in the sector.
Apply
To apply for this Project Accountant role, please use the Apply button.
Walker Hamill has been a specialist finance and strategy recruiter for approaching 40 years. We have an extensive client group, including major multinational listed organisations, private equity backed businesses and privately owned companies. We recruit across all sectors and have particularly strong client relationships in retail, property/real estate, family office, media, technology, leisure and business services.
Please note that due to the expected volume of applications we will only be able to respond to those candidates whose experience matches the requirements of our client. If you have not heard from us within the next ten days, please assume you have been unsuccessful on this occasion.