High Achiever: Yu-Heng Chen Generates Growth in the Sports Product Industry

According to Yu-Heng Chen, product merchandising is not just an art, but a science.

Chen, also known as Howard, is a veteran product merchandise professional who has used his global expertise, analytical rigor, and passion for product development to generate growth for some of the biggest brands in sports retail. He has proven he can produce results, positioning himself as a high achiever in the competitive sportswear and retail industries.

Getting His Start

Chen has extensive experience in the sportswear and retail industries, and he understands that success happens when you know both your consumer and your market. With a passion for both sports and product innovation, Chen’s career journey has been aided by a master’s degree in sports product management from the University of Oregon, as well as his work experience across the globe.

Having managed merchandising operations and inventory strategies across four regions — Asia, North America, South America, and the Pacific — Chen has gained a unique perspective and nuanced understanding of diverse markets and consumer behaviors. This vast experience has enabled him to tailor strategies to varied audiences while achieving company objectives. Chen’s ability to thrive in collaborative and diverse environments and work effectively with teams across continents and departments (such as product creation, planning, and sales) has allowed him to deliver genuine results.

Chen’s career includes creating top-down, multi-channel plans, collaborating with cross-functional teams to optimize sales and profitability, launching new stores, and achieving growth milestones for big global brands. Excelling in a wide range of merchandising aspects, the sports product merchandise professional’s career highlights his skills in analytics, market insights, and consumer engagement.

With the ability to analyze retail metrics, such as sell-through margins and full-price realization, Chen has developed and executed data-driven merchandise strategies that are specific to consumer needs and drive business growth. Chen leverages data to ensure that his decisions are well-informed and actionable.

A Storied Career

Currently, Chen is a senior merchant for Nike’s APLA (Asia Pacific and Latin America) Men’s Sports Merchandising, where he helps develop consumer-led product assortments for men’s basketball, Kobe footwear, and apparel across key marketplaces. Driving profitability that aligns with market and consumer demands, Chen uses data to create merchandising strategies, utilizing retail metrics like sell-through, margin, and full-price realization that help lead to long-term business growth and maximize margins.

Before his role as a senior merchant, Chen was a lead buying associate at Nike. He partnered with merchants, planners, and allocators to drive operational success. Through his skills in order entry, contract administration, price maintenance, and system data management, Chen helped generate 7.2 million receipt units and $500 million in FA24 to SP25 sales.

Chen previously worked as a global merchandising intern at Perry-Ellis International – Nike Swim. At Perry-Ellis, Chen created a dashboard for strategic and seasonal assortment support for the product team and GEO partners, analyzing sell-in and sell-through by evaluating quantitative selling reports that could capitalize on key opportunities for sales optimization and new business growth.

Yu-Heng Chen stays at the top of his game by staying informed on the latest industry insights and tools to understand the market and consumer. With technology and social media changing industries and lives, staying relevant to the latest trends is important to understand the market and consumers. Keeping up-to-date is one reason why Chen has captured promising business opportunities that have generated growth in a massive and competitive industry.

BDG Media newsroom and editorial staff were not involved in the creation of this content.