Fabric Account Manager, Dallas Texas

 Job location:  Dallas, TX  (candidate must reside in and be familiar with driving to clients in the Dallas area).

Valley Forge Fabrics partners with the world’s best design teams to co-create custom decorative textiles and design solutions for global hospitality environments.  We are a 47 years young, trusted and financially secure company that has strong focus on sustainability and innovation. Our Headquarters is in palm-lined Fort Lauderdale but our reach into the hospitality design industry is global.   This might just be the time to spread your textiles wings and soar!

This role offers a generous base salary, bonus potential, paid time off / paid holidays, automobile reimbursement allowance, health benefits, 401K, and more. 

Job Summary:
As an Account Manager in Dallas, you will focus on maintaining and elevating our close customer relationships while being supported by an internal team of project managers in our corporate design center.   You will become an insider to the most exciting upcoming hotel projects while entertaining our customers regularly to lunch, dinner and wine events, art events, sporting events and the like - so, if you enjoy an active 'out of the office' experience on a daily basis this opportunity might be woven just for you. 

Our ideal candidate is someone who has superb relationship building and communications skills, enjoys the spotlight and entertaining and who is a design enthusiast, optimistic, hyper-energized, organized and efficient.  They must also possess excellent customer service and problem-solving skills and be a tenacious project closer with a keen eye for the movement in fashion, interior design and architecture.

Valley Forge clients are stylish, smart and fun-loving (we are also!) and most work within extremely challenging project deadlines.   Our role is to help deliver on our customers’ unique design dreams and to ensure cohesive attention to project timelines all the while making ourselves one of the best parts of their day when we visit them.  A typical work day starts early, delivering requested textile samples, making a lunch presentation on a new product from our offering, dropping off books from our newest collections, consulting with a client on new projects and engaging them in our vast textile library for inspiration, and perhaps ending with a ‘wine down afternoon’ for a special customer or hosting a group of clients for a design or art event.

Primary Responsibilities:

• Travel throughout assigned territory (Dallas Texas) to call on regular and prospective customers to develop custom designs and solicit orders.
• Develop and maintain strong and effective working relationships with specification and purchasing contacts.
• Work with customers during in-person appointments, taking phone calls throughout the day from customers and project teams, scheduling and maintaining full-day appointments.
• Present or demonstrate products, using samples, PowerPoint presentation or catalogs, and emphasizes design, function, sustainability and performance features while focusing on client design, end-use and budget requirements.
• Coordinate with inside sales and project management teams to keep account activities, literature and needs current.
• Investigate, diffuse, and resolve challenges with regards to samples, purchase orders and deliveries within the territory
• Regularly entertain and network with clients and potential clients
• Keep up to date on new design clients and opportunities for engaging on projects outside of our established customer base.
• Travel to Fort Lauderdale for training during onboarding and at other times during the course of work.
• Travel to trade shows overnight on some occasions up to 5-6 times annually.
• Other responsibilities as assigned.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree is required.
• 2+ years of experience working in public relations, commercial design and/or project management, event promotion, professional business-to-business sales, or similar industry.
• Excellent ability to learn new processes, sales, and project management tools.  Proficiency and experience working with business applications.
• Must be socially savvy and comfortable entertaining clients regularly outside of normal working hours.
• Strong problem-solving skills and creativity are required.
• Must have a high level of ownership and accountability with strong organizational skills and the ability to remain focused while simultaneously managing competing projects and priorities.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills including the ability to concisely and precisely articulate important project details to clients and internal design teams is required.
• Experience using MS Excel, Salesforce, and MS Dynamics 365 preferred.
• Strong presentation skills are required.
• Ability to travel regularly is required.
• Regularly required to drive to appointments, walk to client locations and deliver client materials, lift up to 25lbs, bend, reach, prepare samples and perform general administration duties associated with home offices and working remotely while not on appointments.

The culture at Valley Forge is all about our employees and our community. We are a fast-paced and energized group of people who share a purpose for creating a uniquely beautiful world. We invest our time and resources into each other, our local community, having fun and getting things done.

Valley Forge Fabrics, Inc. is an EO employer – M/F/Veteran/Disability