Brand: 8th Ave Food & Provisions

Categories: Marketing

Locations: St. Louis, Missouri

Position Type: Regular Full-Time

Remote Eligible: No

Req ID: 23813

Job Description

Business Unit Overview

8th Avenue Food & Provisions is a growing organization made up of businesses that produce and sell quality products including pasta, peanut butter, granola, and fruit and nut trail mixes to retail, foodservice and ingredient customers. The company was formed in October 2018 through a combination of Post Holdings’ private brands businesses and is owned by Post Holdings and funds affiliated with Thomas H. Lee Partners, L.P. (“THL”), a private equity firm. Responsibilities The ideal candidate will be located in either Fenton, MO or New Hope, MN. Position Summary: This role is accountable for ensuring the 8th Avenue portfolio is supported by packaging solutions that are highly functional, consumer-intuitive, cost-optimized, innovative, and adhere to company standards and industry conventions. The ideal candidate possesses deep technical knowledge of the food packaging space, including packaging design (features, functionalities, and limitations), material/ component specifications, artwork/label design while optimizing cost & operational interactions. She has a strong attention to detail, an awareness of consumer insights, and an understanding of the impact to the company’s P&L. This role supports Branded and Private Label Pasta as primary areas of responsibility.

Duties and Responsibilities:

Packaging portfolio stewardship & optimization Maintain packaging bill-of-materials and specifications for existing portfolio, including primary/secondary packaging and labels Establish and maintain a database of current primary and secondary packaging specifications; work with business units to optimize offerings and reduce redundancy/duplication in packaging specifications Proactively assess and quantify cost optimization potential across items in the portfolio Ensure packaging portfolio Optimizes transportation, product stability, and display requirements Is designed to be compatible with production lines Is in compliance with all internal and external/regulatory requirements Supports company’s sustainability targets Other duties, as assigned New package development & innovation Work with Sales, Product Management, Finance, and Operations to explore and commercialize new products (including those with packaging-inspired innovations) Participate in cost/appeal tradeoff assessments Contribute to the Stage Gate process to ensure packaging requirements are defined and developed in an effective and timely manner Conduct hands-on bench and pilot scale tests to help assess packaging performance, shelf-life, and quality attributes Establish expert knowledge of various packaging materials/substrates - their features, functionalities, limitations, and production line feasibility Quality assurance and supplier management Match appropriate inks and print technologies to desired graphics to ensure effective translation to packaging substrates Validation tests to ensure packaging suppliers are meeting specified standards Work with Procurement to continually assess, nurture, and optimize supplier relationships

Education and Experience Required:

B.S. in Packaging Engineering or Packaging Science plus 5 years’ experience. Certification in Packaging Engineering or Packaging Science plus 7 years’ experience. Recognized as an in-house authority on packaging systems. Strong teamwork, problem solving, and presentation skills. Advanced PC skills: Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Experience with JDE, statistical software desired. Excellent written and verbal communication, conflict resolution, and interpersonal skills. Strong project planning and management skills, ability to lead teams and multiple simultaneous projects effectively. Able to be decisive and repeatedly meet deadlines. Able to remove barriers. Highly motivated individual with ability to work in a fast-paced environment. Ability to travel 30-50% is required.

Preferred Education, Experience, and Skills:

Proven communications ability with all levels of management. Proven leadership in managing new package development. Demonstrated ability to coach and influence others.

Post Holdings provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, marital status, status as a covered veteran and any other category protected under applicable federal, state, provincial and local laws.

Equal Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Individuals with Disabilities

The contractor will not discharge or in any other manner discriminate against employees or applicants because they have inquired about, discussed, or disclosed their own pay or the pay of another employee or applicant. However, employees who have access to the compensation information of other employees or applicants as a part of their essential job functions cannot disclose the pay of other employees or applicants to individuals who do not otherwise have access to compensation information, unless the disclosure is (a) in response to a formal complaint or charge, (b) in furtherance of an investigation, proceeding, hearing, or action, including an investigation conducted by the employer, or (c) consistent with the contractor’s legal duty to furnish information. 41 CFR 60-1.35(c)