Product Owner - Apparel Product Development

ABOUT THE ROLE
Crossian is a high-growth technology-driven e-commerce business. Behind our success is our people. As a start-up formed in 2020, we have created a fast-paced and dynamic environment, enabling our people to reach a cumulative average growth rate of over 1000% in the last 3 years. Our mission now is to build DTC brands and increase customer LTV by providing best-valued products backed by no nonsense customer service policies as Customer Centricity is at the core of our values.
As the Product Owner for Apparel Product Development, you will build the scientific foundation behind how Crossian designs its products, starting with: how our customers' bodies are shaped, how a product presses on and supports different body shapes and sizes, and how each component contributes to fit, function and quality. You will turn that knowledge into a model with clear inputs, assumptions and acceptance ranges that generates the specification for each product construction, working with the Data team on customer data, modelling and validation against real fit sessions and returns, and act as Product Owner for the product development system our Tech team builds around it, so that every new style is developed from the same data, workflow and logic.
WHAT YOU WILL DO
1. Build Product Foundation
Research best practices: Research and study the best proven practices used around the world for apparel product development, with a focus on intimate apparel: how bodies and products are measured, how sizes are defined, how fit, comfort and component function are evaluated (industry standards, leading brands, academic research).
Body-fit foundation: Build the knowledge base for the body side of fit: the body shapes and measurement distribution of Crossian's target customers (anthropometric standards and our own customer data), how the product creates different pressure and support on different body shapes and sizes, and the comfort and pressure thresholds reported in research and wear trials.
Product breakdown: Study the product and break it down into its individual components and factors (materials, trims, features, construction, specification, etc.).
Output: Analyze the logic behind each practice; decide what to adopt, adapt or reject for Crossian's customers, sizes and factories.
2. Modelization
Component-to-quality relationships: Build the relationship between the product components and the product quality factors (fit, function, aesthetics, etc.).
Body-to-job logic: Define the logic that connects the customer's body measurements to the job the product must do (support, lift, comfort, coverage).
Formalize the model: Convert the relationships and logic into a model with clear, named inputs, explicit assumptions and acceptance ranges, applicable across constructions and functions (wired, wireless, sports, push-up, etc.). Work with the Data team on the modelling approach and on the customer, sales and return data that feeds it.
Validate and iterate: Validate the model against reality through fit sessions, wear trials and customer return data, together with the Data team; iterate until it predicts fit and quality reliably.
Outputs: a fit/quality score, a body-to-size rule, and a specification generator per construction type.
3. Software Development
Data definition: Define, with the Data team, the data that must be recorded for every style, size, sample, material, body profile, fit trial and return, and how it connects to existing company data.
Workflow design: Upgrade the product development workflow (brief → concept → spec → sample → fit/validation -> approval for production) together with the Product Development Manager, Technical Design, Merchandising and QC.
System delivery: Combine data, workflow and model; act as Product Owner opposite the Tech team (system) and the Data team (data pipelines and model deployment) to build the product development system