What are the responsibilities and job description for the Business Manager position at Taylor Shellfish Farms?
About Taylor Shellfish Farms
Taylor Shellfish Farms is a family-owned company and one of North America's largest producers of farmed shellfish. Taylor Shellfish is vertically integrated—from hatcheries and farms to processing facilities and restaurants.
The Smokehouse & Cannery is a part of Taylor’s legacy of farmed shellfish. Ekone products are distributed nationally through specialty retailers, grocery channels, and direct-to-consumer. As demand grows, Taylor continues to expand production through both internal manufacturing and strategic co-pack partnerships.
This position plays a key role in scaling the Ekone brand and cannery operations while ensuring alignment between farming, production, sales, and external manufacturing partners.
Position Overview
The Business Manager, Cannery & Smokehouse is responsible for coordinating the operational execution and strategic growth of Taylor Shellfish Farms’ Ekone product line and related co-manufactured products.
This role bridges product strategy, production planning, supply chain logistics, and co-manufacturing partnerships, ensuring that products move efficiently from farm to cannery to market. The position works closely with farming, processing, QA, sales, and external manufacturing partners to ensure production capacity aligns with demand while maintaining quality and profitability.
The ideal candidate combines supply chain expertise, production coordination, pricing strategy, and partnership management in a fast-paced CPG business and food manufacturing environment.
Key Responsibilities
Production & Supply Coordination:
Coordinate production planning between shellfish farming, processing facilities, and cannery operations to ensure raw materials and supplies availability aligns with production schedules.
Work with quality assurance and food safety teams to ensure internal and co-manufactured production meets regulatory and brand standards.
Monitor and optimize production flow across internal facilities and co-pack partners.
Coordinate with internal teams to secure raw materials, ingredients, packaging, and production capacity.
Co-Manufacturing & Partner Management:
Lead the development and management of co-pack manufacturing partnerships.
Negotiate pricing structures, minimum production volumes, and contractual agreements with co-manufacturers.
Manage schedules and prioritize work windows between internal manufacturing and co-pack partners based on capacity, cost, and strategic priorities.
Monitor performance of co-pack partners to ensure quality, cost, and delivery expectations are met.
Maintain strong working relationships with co-manufacturing partners and coordinate production schedules.
Product & Channel Strategy:
Collaborate with sales leadership to recommend product assortments by channel.
Support new product introductions and evaluate opportunities for line extensions and innovation.
Work cross-functionally with sales and marketing teams to ensure production capabilities align with market opportunities.
Develop and maintain SKU-level pricing architecture by channel, ensuring profitability and competitiveness across markets.
Analyze cost inputs including (raw materials, processing costs, packaging, freight and co-pack fees)
Work with finance and leadership to establish margin targets and pricing strategies.
Coordinate sales forecasting and demand planning with internal teams and key customers.
Ensure adequate production capacity is reserved with internal facilities and co-pack partners.
Translate sales forecasts into production schedules and supply plans.
Identify operational constraints and growth opportunities within the cannery and smokehouse operations.
Prepare recommendations for leadership on production expansion, new partnerships, and product opportunities.
Plan, coordinate, and lead cross-functional meetings with company leadership to align on growth initiatives.
Provide data-driven insights to support strategic decisions around capacity, pricing, and market expansion.