Director of Procurement

The Director of Procurement directs the procurement and purchasing operations and builds strategies to provide the ingredients and packaging for our customers. This position provides the services to meet organizational requirements for quality, volume, availability, and pricing. This includes evaluating and developing strategic supplier relationships, negotiating contracts, and implementing systems, developing an ERP plan, assessing risk, and responding to changes in demand or disruptions in the supply chain. This high impact position drives consistent vendor performance through use of scorecard, KPI’s and vendor return cycle management, collaborates with other verticals to define current and future inventory requirements and manage inventory levels, designs processes and systems and utilizes technical tools to analyze data and increase responsiveness to material demands, and incorporates auditing processes to ensure procurement and record-keeping comply with any applicable industry or governmental regulations. This person shall have the ability to transform the purchasing department while meeting immediate business needs at the same time.   Essential Job Functions and Responsibilities:   Contribute to the development of private label programs by sourcing cost effective ingredients, while working closely with the R&D department to request samples and qualify suppliers   Review and understand in-bound freight arrangements with current logistics company to determine if some savings can be realized   Develops vendor relationships and sets vendor KPIs and goals, using scorecards for accountability and performance tracking.   Support the department in enforcing the supplier approval process, which is required to pass the company’s SQF food safety audit, whether it be with customers or internal cross-functioning teams.    Manage inventories, forecast analysis and processing of purchase orders   Monitor and understand market pricing trends on packaging, cartons, and ingredients   Provide regular reporting on inventory turns, potential expiration dates   Develops team of procurement professionals setting clear SMART goals for direct reports and their teams which align with critical short term business goals and individual growth plans   Contract management and administration, negotiation, operations management, purchasing management, risk management, vendor relationships, strategic sourcing   Education: Bachelor’s degree required   Experience: 10 years of managerial experience. Deep knowledge of ingredients and food procurement / sourcing function and solid knowledge of the overall departmental function Competencies: Contracts Management & Administration, Negotiation, Operations Management, Purchasing Management, Risk Management, Vendor Relationships, Strategic Sourcing in the food an ingredient industry   Physical Requirements: Requires prolonged sitting and continuous use of computer. May lift, carry, push, or pull objects up to 10 lbs.   The Director of Procurement position is full-time in the office.