Food Quality Development Manager

People First Supply Chain; Redhill; Hybrid; GBP 55,000 - 75,000; Full time

Job summary

People First Supply Chain is seeking a Food Quality Development Manager in the Gatwick area. The role is hybrid: 3 days in the office and 2 days work from home, with 37.5 hours per week, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm.

You will lead UK private label quality efforts and work with European teams to develop and launch products. You will manage customer quality reviews, audits, and site visits while guiding projects to meet technical requirements.

Qualifications

• Degree in food science/technology or equivalent.
• Experience in a Quality/Development Management role in the UK with private label customer requirements (UK retailers).
• Excellent attention to detail and analytical skills.
• Strong organisational and project management skills.
• IT literacy to a high standard, especially Excel.
• Well-developed communication and influencing skills.
• Flexible and creative problem-solving skills with autonomy and cross-functional collaboration.
• Fluent in French would be a plus.
• Full current driving licence; willingness to travel UK and France as needed.

Responsibilities

• Collaborate with UK private label customers and European quality teams to maintain existing business and progress new opportunities from development to launch.
• Lead customer quality review meetings, audits, and first production site visits to required standards, influencing stakeholders to deliver requirements.
• Manage projects within each customer's process with critical paths ensuring all technical requirements are met.
• Be the key customer contact for quality topics, policy compliance, development, renovation, packaging and product communication.
• Provide effective communication and reporting on quality KPIs, complaints, development projects, specifications, and policy changes.
• Continuously monitor product quality and consistency to meet standards.

Skills

Food Technology

HACCP

BRC

Quality Assurance

Education

Degree in Food Science/Technology

Tools

Excel

Job description

Your New Job Title: Food Quality Development Manager

The Skills You'll Need: Food Technology, HACCP, BRC, Quality Assurance

Location: Gatwick area

Duration: Permanent

Job status: Hybrid: 3 days a week in office, 2 days WFH

Working hours: 37.5 h per week/ Monday - Friday, 9am - 5.30pm

Who you'll be working for: A multinational global dairy producer.

Food Quality Development Manager - What you'll be doing:

• Working with UK private label customers’ technical and quality management, manufacturing sites, dedicated commercial teams and European quality teams to maintain existing private label business and progress new opportunities from development to launch.
• Leading customer quality review meetings, technical compliance audits and first production visits of sites to the standard and practices required as well as influencing key stakeholders to achieve decisions and actions required to deliver customer requirements.
• Managing projects within each customer’s process, critical path ensuring all technical requirements are met.
• Key customer contact for all quality topics, policy compliance, development, renovation, packaging and product communication.
• Effective communication and reporting on quality KPI’s, complaint management, development projects, product specifications, and policy changes.
• Continually monitoring the quality and consistency of products to ensure product quality standards are maintained.

Food Quality Development Manager - The Skills You'll Need to Succeed:

• Educated to degree level or equivalent, with a food science/technology background.
• Previous experience in a Quality/Development Management role, preferably in the UK with expertise of managing private label customer requirements (UK retailers).
• Excellent attention to detail and analytical skills
• Strong organisational and project management skills
• IT literacy to a high standard especially Excel
• Well-developed communication and influencing skills.
• Flexible and creative problem-solving skills to overcome obstacles.
• Highly self-motivated and results focused, with the ability to work autonomously, as well as working closely with the Quality, Industrial, R&D and Commercial teams in the wider business.
• Fluent in French would be a plus.
• Full current driving licence is essential. The position will require the flexibility to travel in the UK as well as travelling regularly to France, as business needs dictate, so applicants must be prepared to spend time away from home in accordance with the requirements of the job.

For eligibility, we can only consider candidates who are eligible to work in the UK and are able to provide relevant supporting documentation.

People First is committed to increasing diversity, and maintaining an inclusive workplace culture. We welcome applications from all qualified candidates regardless of their ethnicity, race, gender, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, age, marital status or whether or not they have a disability.