Senior R&D Engineer, Foodservice Plastics & Innovation

Flint Hills Resources; Neenah (WI); On-site; USD 105,000 - 140,000; Full time

Job summary

Georgia-Pacific, a Koch company, seeks a Senior Product Development Engineer to lead development, qualification, and commercialization of cutlery and related foodservice products in the Neenah Technical Center, Wisconsin.

You will drive product innovation, apply plastics processing knowledge, and collaborate across suppliers, labs, and manufacturing locations to deliver scalable, high-quality solutions.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering, Plastics Engineering, Polymer Engineering, Materials Science, Chemical Engineering, or related discipline, with at least 7 years of relevant experience; or an equivalent combination of education and directly relevant experience.
• Hands-on experience with injection molding and thermoforming, including product development, tooling, materials, process optimization, troubleshooting, and commercial scale-up.
• Experience developing or commercializing high-volume consumer, foodservice, packaging, or molded products.
• Experience leading product, material, supplier, tooling, or manufacturing qualifications using clear test plans and acceptance criteria.
• Demonstrated ability to solve complex technical problems through data analysis, experimentation, root-cause analysis, and cross-functional implementation.
• Experience working directly with suppliers and manufacturing operations.
• Ability to communicate technical information clearly and influence decisions across technical and non-technical audiences.
• Willingness and ability to travel and work in laboratory and manufacturing environments.

Responsibilities

• Provide technical leadership for product development, commercialization, and lifecycle support for cutlery and related foodservice products.
• Apply plastics processing, product design, materials, tooling, and manufacturing knowledge to develop and improve products.
• Plan and execute experiments, prototypes, trials, and data analysis to guide technical decisions.
• Lead or support qualifications of products, materials, tools, suppliers, and manufacturing processes while balancing performance, quality, cost, and supply needs.
• Diagnose and resolve product, process, quality, and customer-use issues using structured problem solving and practical experimentation.
• Collaborate with business, innovation, sourcing, quality, operations, engineering, product stewardship, suppliers, and customers.
• Support the development of sustainable and regulatory-relevant product and material solutions.
• Maintain appropriate technical documentation, specifications, test methods, and development records.
• Share expertise and help build R&D capability through coaching and knowledge transfer.
• Travel as needed to support suppliers, manufacturing, customers, and commercialization activities.
• Work safely and effectively in laboratory, pilot, manufacturing, and supplier environments.

Skills

Injection molding

Thermoforming

Product development

Data analysis

Root-cause analysis

Cross-functional collaboration

Communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering or related field

Tools

CAD

Job description

Georgia-Pacific, a Koch company, seeks a Senior Product Development Engineer to lead development, qualification, and commercialization of cutlery and related foodservice products in the Neenah Technical Center, Wisconsin.

You will drive product innovation, apply plastics processing knowledge, and collaborate across suppliers, labs, and manufacturing locations to deliver scalable, high-quality solutions.