Procurement Manager, Packaging

Position Summary:

This individual will proactively manage the direct raw material supply base to meet Ventura Foods Customer Experience by procuring Packaging materials that meet service, quality, cost, inventory, growth, and innovation business requirements.

Major Duties and Responsibilities:

• Develop and manage multi-million-dollar Packaging Category Strategies within the Direct Procurement organization as we as support high level Procurement initiatives.
• Good understanding and expertise of Packaging raw materials, substrates, chemicals and others related to the industry, as well as to leverage market/commodity insights, inflation mitigation techniques, escalation/de-escalation agreements, to forecast, decision making and secure market competitive pricing.
• Proactively monitor and manage internal and external risk to ensure continuity of supply.
• Proactively partner with suppliers, and with external category expert partners to identify, assess, develop business cases, prioritize, and execute cost savings initiatives that leverage product optimization, service/quality optimization, supplier optimization, process improvement, competitive bidding, "should cost" modeling, joint continuous improvement, supplier negotiations, etc.
• Support and implement Ventura’s Supplier Relationship Management program for assigned suppliers to ensure continuous improvement and long-term collaborative relationships as we as ead and support Supplier Performance Management to track and analyze key performance metrics in a recurrent basis for key Packaging suppliers, including Service, Quality, Cost and Innovation.
• Partner closely with senior leadership across Ventura’s Sales & Marketing, Engineering, Finance, Supply Chain and Quality to understand and support business strategy and priorities as well as represent Procurement as a strategic partner to drive value and collaboration.
• Provide quarterly updates on cost inflation by category, and update quarterly standard costs.
• Elaborate and establish best practices to develop and execute supplier agreements.
• Lead sustainability and diversity programs for Packaging suppliers within Ventura Foods.
• Support tactical activities related to Procurement Category Management and additional responsibilities, as assigned.

Education and Experience:

• Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent Manufacturing Operations experience is required.
• Packaging procurement experience is required.
• 7 years Purchasing and/or Supply Chain Planning experience.
• 5 years Procurement and/or Strategic Sourcing experience, including vendor selection, negotiation, commercial agreements, and supplier performance management.
• Bachelor’s Degree in Supply Chain Management, Industrial or Packaging Engineering or Business is desired.
• Master's degree (M.B.A.) is beneficial.
• Prior experience managing a team is helpful.
• CPSM is highly desirable.
• Experience in food manufacturing environment is beneficial, experience in Packaging components is highly desirable.
• ERP or MRP experience (SAP, JDE, etc.) is strongly helpful.
• Knowledge of substrates market indexes, like IHS, etc. is helpful.

Knowledge and Skills:

• Demonstrates strategic thinking combined with tactical actions.
• Successfully leads and influences key stakeholders at all levels and across diverse functions, cultures, regions, suppliers, and sites.
• Effective working in a matrix organization and comfortable working in teams.
• Strong leadership, project management, negotiation, influence, and presentation skills.
• Adept at influencing change and alignment with the ability to foster partnerships up and down all levels of the organization with areas such as Supply Chain, Packaging Engineering, Quality, Finance, Manufacturing, S& Ops,
• Strong overall business acumen and organizational savvy with the ability to effectively deal with ambiguity.
• Excellent oral and written communication skills.
• Results oriented, self-starter, and able to handle multiple initiatives while meeting all key objectives and deadlines.
• Strong analytical and problem solving skills.
• Proficient with analytical and presentation software including Microsoft Excel, Access, PowerPoint, and Word.