Senior Director of Product Management & Brand Marketing

Senior Director of Product Management & Brand Marketing Ellsworth, WI Description Ellsworth Cooperative Creamery is seeking an energetic, outgoing, and positive Senior Director of Product Management & Brand Marketing to join our growing team. Since 1910, we’ve partnered with local farmers to craft award-winning cheese and remain committed to our Team, Craft & Community. This is an exciting opportunity to grow your career with a company that values teamwork, creativity, and innovation in a fun, fast-paced environment. Benefits Package: Benefits eligible the 1st of the month following 30 days of employment. Medical, Health Savings Account, Dental, Vision, Accident, Critical Illness and Hospital insurances available. Employee Assistance Program (EAP) and additional free resources. 401k match, Paid Time Off & Holiday Pay Reports to: Chief Commercial Officer Direct Reports: Product Management, R&D, Marketing Services (Internal + External Agencies), Market Research functions FLSA Status: Exempt/Salaried Position Overview The Senior Director of Product Management & Brand Marketing is responsible for driving profitable growth of the company’s cheese and dairy product portfolio through consumer-led innovation, disciplined product management, and differentiated brand positioning and brand-building plans. This role has direct leadership responsibility for the Product Management, R&D, Marketing Services, and Market Research functions, ensuring tight alignment from insight to formulation to launch to brand-building. As a senior commercial leader and head of the Marketing function, this position serves as the connective tissue between innovation, brand strategy, and commercial execution, partnering closely with Sales, Trade Marketing, Operations, Supply Chain, Finance, and IT to bring differentiated dairy products to market efficiently and at scale. This role sits at the intersection of consumer insight, product strategy, brand positioning, and commercial execution, ensuring that products win on retail shelf, online, and in foodservice. Core Responsibilities Product Management & Portfolio Strategy (Direct Ownership): Own the end-to-end product lifecycle across core, value-added, and innovation platforms in current and future dairy categories (i.e., cheese, dairy-ingredients, and future adjacent dairy categories). Current Cheese Categories include Cheese Curds, Block/Specialty Natural Cheese, and Cheese Spreads & Process Cheese. Lead portfolio strategy including innovation prioritization, renovation, cost optimization, and SKU rationalization across Retail, Foodservice, and Industrial Product Lines. Lead new product development (NPD) from concept through launch, including stage-gate management, business cases, and commercialization readiness. Translate consumer, customer, and market insights into compelling product concepts and value propositions. Establish and manage a stage-gate innovation process, ensuring speed, rigor, and cross-functional alignment. Own product P&Ls, pricing strategy, margin targets, and post-launch performance tracking. Lead development of sales tools, sell-in stories, innovation decks, and customer presentations. Support key customer meetings and innovation sell-in as a product and brand subject-matter expert. Research & Development Leadership (Direct Ownership): Lead R&D to translate consumer and customer insights into scalable, compliant, and commercially viable dairy products. Partner with Operations, QA, Supply Chain, and Finance to ensure formulations meet cost, yield, quality, shelf-life, and manufacturing constraints. Drive continuous improvement in formulation taste, texture, appearance, nutrition, and clean-label initiatives. Oversee packaging development and regulatory, labeling, and claims development in coordination with Quality and Regulatory/Legal. Brand Strategy & Marketing Services (Direct Ownership): Define and steward brand positioning, architecture, and messaging across the portfolio. Lead brand planning, including annual marketing strategies, campaign development, and innovation launch support. Lead Marketing Services, including management of internal creative resources and external agencies across Marketing Plan elements (branding, packaging, digital/social media, website, PR/Influencers, sponsorships/events). Ensure brand consistency across packaging, advertising, digital assets, sales materials, and foodservice collateral. Oversee packaging strategy, design refreshes, and innovation packaging and launch support. Market Research & Insights (Direct Ownership): Own the company’s consumer, customer, and category insights agenda. Leverage syndicated data (e.g., Circana/Nielsen), customer data, qualitative research, and trend analysis to inform decisions. Translate insights into clear innovation briefs, positioning, and value propositions. Support post-launch evaluation and portfolio optimization through data-driven learnings. Cross-Functional Collaboration This role partners closely across the organization to ensure successful commercialization and sustained growth: Sales: Develop customer-ready innovation stories, support key account sell-ins, and align portfolio priorities with customer needs. Trade Marketing: Align brand strategy with promotions, merchandising, pricing, and channel-specific execution. Operations: Ensure innovation and renovation plans are executable within plant capabilities, labor, and throughput constraints. Supply Chain: Align sourcing and distribution strategies, inventory and production planning, and cost targets with product roadmaps. Finance: Build innovation business cases, manage budgets, track ROI, and deliver margin improvement. IT: Partner on managing syndicated research data and other data analytics, R&D formula & product spec systems, demand forecasting tools, product P&L’s and Margin tracking systems, and digital asset management. Requirements Qualifications Required Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Business, or related field (MBA preferred). 15+ years of progressive experience in branded dairy foods or CPG food manufacturing, with leadership across product management and brand marketing. Demonstrated experience leading product development with Innovation and R&D teams in a manufacturing environment. Demonstrated experience positioning and building successful Branded Businesses including developing and executing strategic plans and annual business and marketing plans. Strong understanding of dairy processing, formulation, shelf-life, regulatory, and labeling requirements. Proven ability to influence cross-functional teams in a mid-sized, resource-constrained organization. Preferred Experience across retail, foodservice, and industrial dairy channels. Background in clean label, high-protein, or value-added dairy innovation. Experience managing external agencies and research partners. Core Competencies Consumer- and customer-centric thinking Strong commercial and financial acumen Clear, persuasive communicator Hands-on leadership with strategic vision Ability to balance speed, cost, and quality in innovation Comfort operating in a dynamic, growth-oriented dairy business