Area Manager - West NL

Wakuli

Den Haag

On-site

EUR 39,000 - 40,000

Full time

3 days ago

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Benefits offered by this job

Monthly salary 3,450–3,600 EUR

Travel expenses covered

Unlimited coffee

Growth opportunities

Direct access to coffee producers

Job summary

Wakuli, shaping the future of coffee, is seeking an Area Manager to lead our Store Managers across West NL. You will coach leaders, drive store performance, and ensure a consistent operating model as we expand. The role is hands-on, in-store, and requires weekly travel across the region.

You will manage 8+ years of hospitality/retail experience and champion data-driven improvements. English fluency is essential; Dutch is a strong plus.

Qualifications

8+ years experience in hospitality or retail, incl. 3+ years in multi-site management
Ability to coach Store Managers to own their results
Comfort reading P&L, labour reports and dashboards
Strong ownership, structure and service quality
Fluency in English; Dutch a strong plus
Availability of 38 hours/week; willingness to travel regionally

Responsibilities

Lead Store Managers across West NL and oversee Multi Store Managers and their teams
Spend 90% of time on ground coaching, challenging and supporting SMs
Develop succession plans and grow Team Leads into future SMs
Contribute to hiring for key roles and ensure effective onboarding
Collaborate with Marketing and Product to drive regional campaigns and revenue
Open new stores and ramp up existing ones while maintaining performance

Skills

Coaching managers

P&L literacy

Data-driven decisions

English fluency

Dutch language (advantage)

Travel readiness

Leadership

Retail/hospitality experience

Job description

Join us to lead our store managers & grow our impact

About Wakuli

We are building the future of coffee. One that is seriously good for drinkers, farmers and the planet.

How? By working directly with farmer groups around the world. We set up transparent, traceable export lines, freshly roast ourselves and serve the coffee straight to customers. These short supply chains make sure we can always pay farmers a good price, while also investing in fully regenerative coffee production.

You’ll find us in bars across the Netherlands, and online through our own platform. For customers, that means freshly roasted specialty coffee that’s easy to get, and just seriously delicious.

We are building the future of coffee with a team of like-minded people from all over the world. And we're looking for you.

We're looking for a strong, driven Area Manager to lead our Store Managers across West NL. You'll raise the standard in every store and help build a store operating model that works the same way in every new city we open in.

You lead leaders. You coach Store Managers to own their stores’ results, spot what’s working and spread it, and you're accountable for the performance of your region.

What You'll Do

You're responsible for all Wakuli stores in West NL and the Multi Store Managers who run them, with their Team Leads and barista teams behind them. Today the region covers Rotterdam, Leiden and Den Haag. Your region will grow through 2027 as we open new stores, so the team you lead in December will be bigger than the one you start with.

Your role is hands on and in the stores. You spend 90% of your time on the ground in your region, coaching, challenging and supporting your SMs to make each store better each week. You're in the stores to lead, share feedback and support the growth of our team and our impact, not to cover shifts.

Leadership and team development

You coach your Store Managers with clarity and structure, helping them find their own answers rather than handing them yours
You run regular performance conversations and 1:1s, and you hold the standard consistently across stores
You plan for succession in every store. You develop Team Leads into future SMs and grow brand ambassadors in every team, and you use our pay grades and training progression to give people a clear path
You support hiring for key roles, and make sure onboarding sets every new starter up well
You create a culture people want to be part of, and stay in: fair, ambitious and energised

Growing your region

We're opening 12 new stores across the Netherlands in 2027, several of them in West NL. Your region, and your team, will grow through the year.

You build the team for every new store: you hire the Store Manager ahead of opening and make sure the whole team is trained and ready before the doors open
You support each new store through its ramp-up, and you act fast if one falls behind
You keep your existing stores performing while their people help open new ones
You plan ahead with our Openings Manager, so your region’s growth never takes you by surprise
You help build and test the playbooks and toolkit we use every time we open a store

Performance and growth

You own the results you can steer: wage cost against budget, stores open and running on time, store standards and team health. Together with Marketing and Product you drive revenue, making sure every campaign and range lands in every store
You use the store health dashboard with your SMs to steer on the drivers that grow a store: footfall, CPG sales, loyalty and food revenue
You manage labour smartly: wage cost on budget, and hours and payroll right first time
You turn data into action. You find the gaps between stores and close them by copying what the best stores do
You make every store part of its neighbourhood, with regular community activity in every store

Working across Wakuli

You work closely with our Marketing Team to deliver our campaigns impactfully in our stores
You share best practice with the other Area Managers and the wider Store Management Team

What We're Looking For

This is a role for someone who's led managers, not only teams. You know how to get results through other people, and how to grow people while you do it. Starting 1st January 2027.

You bring:

8+ years of experience in hospitality or retail, including 3+ years in multi-site management
A track record of coaching managers to own their results
Confidence with numbers. You can read a P&L, a labour report and a dashboard, and you know what to do next
Strong operational instincts and a sharp sense of ownership, structure and service quality
Fluency in English (Dutch is a strong plus)
Availability of 38 hours/week, flexible across the week, including weekends when the region needs it
Willingness to travel across your region every week

What We Offer

A key role in a fast-scaling impact company
A steep learning curve and plenty of growth opportunities. We're opening 12 more stores in 2027, which comes with lots of opportunities
A team of 170+ impact-driven colleagues from 30+ countries
Direct access to our coffee producers and full coffee value chain
Monthly salary between €3,450 and €3,600 (based on 38 hours)
Naturally all travel expenses are covered
And of course, unlimited coffee

Our culture

We lead with purpose. We are direct, but kind. We give feedback to help each other grow. We make mistakes, but we own them. We move fast, but we don't move alone.

We live by three principles: