Brand Director (Growth Studio)
Manchester (hybrid)
• Full-time
• Reports to: CEO
The custodian. The one who sweats the angles, protects the codes, and proves how craft moves the numbers.
The role
You'll be the communication centre of Hairburst across every channel. Set the story, set the standard, ship work that compounds into enterprise value.
You guard the details: typography, colour, lighting, claims, and connect those choices to velocity, conversion and retention.
You'll partner with country GMs to turn brand into demand, and with Product to make sure proof powers every claim.
This isn't a slides-and-guidelines seat. It's strategic and hands-on. You'll own global brand, creative direction, ambassador strategy, hero product storytelling, and the economics that prove it's working.
About Hairburst:
We sit where beauty meets wellbeing. Haircare built with science, validated in the mirror. Started with £4k; bought by JD Sports in 2021; bought back by the founders in m + community. You'll find us in Boots, Holland & Barrett plus DTC and marketplaces.
What you'll own
Brand strategy & codes
→ The narrative, visual system, verbal identity. Simple, distinctive, unmistakable.
Creative direction
→ Concept to toolkit. Retail theatre, DTC journeys, marketplace content, creator frameworks. Craft that travels without drifting off-brand.
Global ambassadors
→ Build a portfolio that actually delivers—awareness, consideration, conversion—with clear payback windows.
Performance × brand
→ Make brand fuel performance creative. Every brand bet has a conversion path; every performance asset protects the brand.
Hero product stories
→ Launch playbooks for hero SKUs grounded in evidence. Ingredients → benefits, never over-claimed.
Product partnership
→ Feed brand insight into NPD. Naming, packaging, claims, go-to-market.
Scorecard
→ Track brand health (consideration, share of search, NPS) and tie it to CM%, CAC/LTV, velocity, repeat.
Team & partners
→ Lead a small, senior crew. Brief hard, hold the bar, coach for outcomes.
Your unfair advantage
The Growth Studio:
Brand, creative, performance, CRM, CX, e-com, data plus retail and marketplace leaders; all around the same table. Not support but proper collaborators.
* Country GMs set the commercial priorities; you give them the ammunition
* Weekly working sessions: clear reads, fast iteration, integrated campaigns
* AI-native: faster testing, sharper targeting, predictive creative scoring
* One plan, shared dashboards, and monthly narrative updates
You
Custodian energy.
You're exacting about images, angles, type, claims, and you can connect those choices to outcomes. You notice what others miss. You're a bit fussy, frankly (in the best way).
Evidence-led storyteller.
Fluent in ingredients, actives, outcomes. You can translate science without the waffle. An interest in supplements and nutrition is a strong plus.
Commercial.
You talk in CM%, CAC/LTV, velocity, repeat, and you can prove how brand moves those numbers.
Maker + strategist.
Moodboard to media plan, you care about both. You can brief and judge creative (type, layout, motion, pack), and you're comfortable on set.
Leader.
Sharp briefs, useful feedback, high standards without the faff. You get the best out of specialists.
Data-literate & AI-native.
Creative testing, brand tracking, cohort analysis. You already use AI to brief faster, test smarter, and scale winners.
Signals we want
→ Work that people noticed and bought
→ A before/after with numbers (brand was here → you did this → now it's there)
→ Evidence you've improved velocity, repeat, CAC/LTV, ROAS—while keeping the brand intact
→ Bar-raising across loads of touchpoints, not just one hero moment
Success looks like (12 months)
✓ Brand health up, unit economics better (consideration/NPS ↑, CM%/CAC ↑)
✓ Hero playbooks documented—markets can run them without drift
✓ Creator engine with proven payback by tier and format
✓ Measurable gains from evidence-led storytelling and retention content
✓ Retail theatre that actually correlates with sustained velocity
✓ A team known for clarity, craft and tempo
Package:
Strong six-figure package + uncapped performance upside + clear equity path for outperformance
Apply with your CV + 300 words on one of these:
1. Taste → outcomes
Show us one piece of brand work you've led that moved commercial numbers (what did you make and what did they deliver commercially?).
2. Science → story
Take a hero ingredient (e.g biotin, saw palmetto, caffeine) and explain how you'd tell its story across three channels
Pick one. Not both.
Equal opportunities employer. Excited but don't tick every box? We'd still like to hear from you.