Coffee Quality & Innovation Leader (Sensory & SQF)

Canterbury Coffee; Richmond; On-site; CAD 88,000 - 110,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health benefits

Vacation benefits

Group Benefits Program

Vacation Purchase Program

Employee pricing

Free on-site parking

Learning & development

Job summary

Canterbury Coffee is seeking a Quality & Innovation Manager to unite passion for exceptional coffee with expertise in sensory evaluation, food safety, quality systems and continuous improvement. Reporting to the VP Operations, you will lead quality programs from green coffee through finished product, establish cupping standards, and drive audit readiness and supplier approvals.

This role blends leadership of the QA team with collaboration across sourcing, roasting, production and warehousing to

Qualifications

• 4+ years of food and beverage manufacturing quality or food safety experience.
• Experience leading or coaching QA staff and building, implementing and improving quality systems.
• Strong working knowledge of SQF, HACCP, GMP, sanitation, traceability, recall, supplier approval and document control.
• Experience with audits, CAPA, risk assessment, process change control and continuous improvement.
• Knowledge of CFIA, Health Canada and applicable customer requirements; FDA knowledge where relevant.

Responsibilities

• Lead coffee sensory evaluation and own cupping standards, protocols, calibration and cup-quality expectations in partnership with Green Coffee Sourcing and Roasting.
• Apply sensory expertise and quality insights to strengthen coffee quality, consistency, sourcing decisions, product development, commercialization and innovation.
• Own the SQF food safety and quality management system, including HACCP, GMP, traceability, recall, food defence and food fraud programs.
• Establish and verify SOPs, sanitation standards and process controls, ensuring compliance across roasting, packaging and warehousing.
• Lead SQF, customer, internal and regulatory audits, maintaining audit readiness and driving effective root cause analysis, CAPA and continuous improvement.
• Oversee supplier and material approval, product verification, sanitation, pest control, complaints, nonconforming product, traceability and recall readiness.
• Provide QA risk assessment and sign-off for product, packaging, specification, trial and engineering changes, including verification before release.
• Support health and safety programs, training, investigations and corrective actions.

Skills

Sensory evaluation

Food safety

Quality systems

Continuous improvement

Audits

CAPA

Root cause analysis

Education

Food Science / Microbiology background

SQF Practitioner training

HACCP training

Job description

Canterbury Coffee is seeking a Quality & Innovation Manager to unite passion for exceptional coffee with expertise in sensory evaluation, food safety, quality systems and continuous improvement. Reporting to the VP Operations, you will lead quality programs from green coffee through finished product, establish cupping standards, and drive audit readiness and supplier approvals.

This role blends leadership of the QA team with collaboration across sourcing, roasting, production and warehousing to