Description

Position Summary/Objective of job: 

The Commercialization Technician is responsible for ensuring the execution and quality of our annual product strategy. This person is a partner to multiple teams within Salt & Straw and will work closely with the Culinary Development team, Food Safety team, Supply Chain & Planning team, and Manufacturing Operations team. The key deliverable is ensuring that our manufacturing team is organized and cross-departmentally communicating for fast and efficient rollout of new recipes and products.

Essential Functions:

Project Manage the rollout of all new ice cream flavors: 

• Own the project management process for new recipes in every step of production from completed benchtop testing to commercialization.

• Provide daily status updates to the Culinary Development team to ensure recipe handoff is staying on target.

• Lead weekly cross-functional “Launch Meeting” to review project status and department updates; provide feedback on overall process status and timeline.

• Facilitate team feedback regarding overall project status and timing and make recommendations to ensure the project meets all goals; assist with publishing the flavor routing/time estimate for every new recipe.

• Directly manage the publishing and communication of recipe change-orders based on Quality Assurance (QA) and Culinary Development instructions.

Audit manufacturing feasibility and testing schedule for our annual product strategy and support creating executional strategies:

• Coordinate production trial runs of new products of in-house production including packaging trials; characterize, troubleshoot, and resolve issues in collaboration with the Culinary Development team, QA, and Operations leaders.

• Coordinate feedback from Operations and Culinary Development teams to audit and edit work Instructions prior to a recipe rollout.

• Facilitate communication between R&D and Supply Chain to support onboarding of new ingredients, including optimal solutions for pack sizing, process implementation, and quality improvement

Create & Manage product specification sheets and process maps: 

• Manage quality testing of new recipes with QA team, document data, and work with Supply Chain and Commercialization team to recommend product standards.

• Support QA team as they create specification sheets.

• Support R&D and Purchasing teams in identifying long-lead items, test and create shelf-life standards for WIP and raw ingredients.

• Work with QA team to create standards for sensory studies, shelf-life validation, microbiology standards, food safety process controls, and consumer acceptability.

• Support the audit process of marketing and training materials to ensure flavor descriptors match the specification sheets.

Additional Responsibilities: 

• Other duties as assigned. 

Qualifications

Qualifications:

• A BS degree in Food Science, or 5 years in food manufacturing and industrial baking (or equivalent combination of education/experience).

• 2 years of R&D Project Management/Product Lifecycle experience in the food/beverage industry preferred.

• Intermediate math proficiency; ability to work with conversions, percentages, fractions, and convert units of measure.

• Knowledge of statistics.

• Availability to work full-time days and occasional evenings.

• Knowledge of food manufacturing regulatory requirements in relation to product and formula development.

Knowledge and Critical Skills: 

• Fluency in English: reading, writing, speaking.

• Excellent written and verbal communication abilities; excellent interpersonal skills with the ability to effectively communicate and build rapport with individuals at various levels of the organization.

• Strong organizational/prioritization skills with an ability to multi-task to manage multiple projects while maintaining a close attention to detail.

• The ability to be a positive, collaborative and effective relationship builder and to serve others, including direct reports, with understanding, respect and care.

• Strong leader and peer influencer.

• Ability to bring hospitality into all interactions with team, direct reports, customer and vendor relationships.

• Creative and resourceful, flexible to change.

Physical Demands:

• Occasionally required to lift and carry up to 30 lbs.

• Sitting 50% of the time.

• Standing 25% of the time.

• Walking 25% of the time.

Work Environment:

• Primarily open office environment that is noisy at times.

• The primary work environment is bright and well-lit.

• Frequently in controlled climate conditions.

• Occasionally the work environment is a confined space where spatial awareness is very important.

• 5%-10% of time will be in the production room, which is between 50-60 degrees.

• Occasionally be in refrigerators 32-40 degrees and in freezers -15 to 0 degrees.

• Occasionally strong scents & odors, depending on ingredients and cleaning.

Salt and Straw Values

Create The Unbelievable

Show Up Generously

Act With Thoughtful Curiosity

Share Human Kindness

Make It Count

Commuter Benefits

Salt & Straw offers an employer-sponsored Commuter Benefit, administered by ALICE. This benefit allows you to set aside pre-tax dollars to use for certain work-related commuting expenses. These expenses include qualified parking costs, mass transit expenses, and ride sharing. 
The IRS establishes a maximum amount of commuter assistance benefits that a Team Member can exclude from income for tax purposes. The limits for 2023 are $300 per month for qualified parking, and $300 per month for mass transit and ride sharing.

To learn more about your ALICE Commuter Benefit, visit https://thisisalice.com/faqs/.

Accessibility Support

Salt & Straw offers support for those who need assistance with our online application process to provide an equal employment opportunity to all job seekers, including individuals with disabilities. If you are a U.S. applicant and desire a reasonable accommodation to complete a job application, please contact our HR team at ta@saltandstraw.com.

Salt & Straw is proud to be an equal-opportunity employer of all qualified individuals. We will consider all people - minorities, women, veterans and individuals with disabilities no matter their sexual orientation or gender identity. Salt & Straw will consider giving opportunities to qualified individuals with criminal histories when it aligns with federal, state and local statutes.

Salt & Straw participates in E-Verify. We will provide the Social Security Administration, and if necessary, the Department of Homeland Security, with information from each new employee’s Form I-9 to confirm work authorization. Please note that we do not use this information to pre-screen job applicants.

We can’t wait to meet you!