Careers & Culture

A President who brings bagels for breakfast every Friday for all of his employees? A company that has "bring-your-dog-to-work" days, offers a matching 401k program, paid sick leave and even has a corporate bonus program? These are just a few of the great perks of working for a wonderful, family-owned company like Charles River Apparel.

Charles River Apparel is an exciting and fast-paced, family-owned business and a leader in the field of activewear apparel manufacturing. The company prides itself on not only giving back to the community but also giving to its employees. Charles River Apparel has been listed as one of “Boston's Best Places to Work” by the prestigious Boston Magazine due to the level of benefits offered to employees and the overall satisfaction of its staff. The company was also chosen as of the Top 10 Small Businesses in Massachusetts for 2011 by The Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce.

Charles River Apparel owes much of its success to their dedicated employees and that is one of the many reasons why the company offers a wide range of benefits including: a matching 401(k) plan, tuition reimbursement, a corporate bonus program, monthly free lunches and birthday celebrations, discounted movie tickets, discounted gym membership, “Bagel Fridays” dependent/healthcare flexible spending accounts, comprehensive healthcare/dental insurance and even apparel discounts. The company’s corporate casual atmosphere is inviting and makes for both a productive and positive work environment.

We are always looking for intelligent, energetic and team-oriented people. Candidates that are interested in applying for open positions should email their resume to jobs@charlesriverapparel.com. Charles River Apparel is also on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/charlesriverapparel.

Current Job Openings

Human Resources Director
Controller
Sales & Trade Show Coordinator

Human Resources Director

Reporting to the CEO, the Human Resources Director partners with the management team to drive company performance and growth, and at the same time, fosters a culture of employee engagement and effective communication at all levels.

• Accomplishes results by communicating job expectations; planning, monitoring, and appraising job results; coaching, counseling, and disciplining employees.
• Enhances company success through effective performance management and communication of goals, metrics, policies and procedures.
• Sustains equitable compensation by designing and administering pay, benefits, incentive, and bonus programs; managing the payroll function.
• Improves employee satisfaction by identifying and responding to concerns; developing morale-building programs.
• Assists managers in hiring, training, developing and supervising employees.

Attributes:

• Excels in a fast-paced, changing environment
• Results oriented, performance driven through metrics
• Exceptional communication and interpersonal skills (written and verbal) with the ability to communicate to employees at all levels of the organization.

Requirements:

• Bachelor's degree required; master’s preferred
• 6-8 years progressively responsible HR Management experience

Controller

The Controller is responsible for the accounting organization including financial reporting, general ledger, accounts receivable, accounts payable, payroll, sales & use tax and other related tax filings. The position is responsible for the integrity, accuracy and timeliness of financial information for the CFO. Controller is also responsible for delivering a high level of support to the CFO and other executives for key analysis, metrics and projects. Controller needs to possess strong integrity and ethical standards, strong financial competencies, strong operations, business & IT knowledge and good leadership skills managing the accounting group. Controller should demonstrate prior success with hands on approach and experience working with privately held companies in range of $30M to $100M. Retail or apparel experience would be beneficial.

• Ensure that our monthly and quarterly financial information (income statement, balance sheet, cash flow, capital spending) are accurate, timely and properly understood.
• Build structure to financial closing processes including improved financial reporting, balance sheet account reconciliations and more automation to closing.
• Manage and improve credit & collections process for high transactional business with high volume of orders, payments and credit analysis.
• Manage payroll and other benefits administration (401K, Health Reimbursement Account, other).
• Manage and prepare Sales & Use tax returns for applicable states. Comfort dealing with sales tax audits.
• Handle rebate/incentive plans with customers, rep commissions, markdowns on inventory and other programs.
• Improve financial reporting & analysis through enhancements to ERP reporting, report writing and other financial analysis (including training with Cognos and working with ERP provider ABS).  Strong Excel skills.
• Handle monthly debt covenant reporting on revolving debt.
• Develop cash forecasting (quarterly)
• Review key cycles for improvement including Order to Cash and Procure to Pay.
• Maintain fully staffed, well trained and highly motivated Finance. Work to improve cross training.

Attributes

• Strong ERP skills (system is “ABS – Apparel Business System”)
• Strong Excel skills working with Pivot Tables and advanced queries.
• Report writing skills or experience working with other business intelligence SW.

Experience

• Min 8+ years (public accounting, industry mix desirable).
• CPA and/or MBA preferred.

Sales & Trade Show Coordinator

The Sales & Trade Show Coordinator will coordinate a variety of areas within the Sales Department including trade shows, national accounts and buying groups as well as day-to-day sales requests, sales reports and statistic tracking.

• Coordinate all aspects of the pre-show process to ensure a successful show.
• Attend key trade shows to ‘work the booth,’ evaluate booth staff and overall show success and oversee set-up crews to ensure proper set-up/break down and shipping logistics are executed.
• Coordinate all aspects of the post-show process including prepping orders for the Customer Service Department and highlighting important Customer Service notes.
• Track expenses of the Sales Dept including general monthly department expenses and Sales Rep expense reports. Coordinate all financial aspects of the trade shows process including tracking financial expenses of Trade Shows using Traq-It software program and Excel; helping to budget and forecast for all trade show expenses.
• Coordinate all paperwork related to customer programs, national accounts and buying groups. Act as a liaison between the national accounts/buying groups to ensure Charles River Apparel has up-to-date membership lists and that new members are sent to the appropriate internal departments for follow-up.

Attributes

• Individual must be highly detail-oriented with excellent organizational skills and be able to identify potential problems and develop proactive solutions
• Have the ability to multi-task and meet frequent deadlines while maintaining priorities and reaching goals in a timely manner
• Ability to thrive in a deadline-driven, fast-paced environment is crucial
• Outgoing and friendly attitude both in person and over the phone.
• Thorough knowledge of Microsoft Word and Excel
• Knowledge of Traq-It Trade Show program or similar software a plus
• Knowledge of Goldmine or a similar contact management system a plus
• Apparel/promotional product industry experience a plus

Requirements

• The candidate must possess a Bachelor’s Degree
• The candidate must possess minimum one year trade show/event coordination experience
• Sales and/or marketing background a plus

• This position involves up to 25% travel within the Continental United States
• Occasional weekend work required
• Must be able to lift up to 40 lbs
• Occasional trade show booth assembly (set-up and breakdown) is required