Job Description
As Smallhold’s Product Development Director, you will be responsible for envisioning, roadmapping and leading educational, community-building and environmental impact initiatives on and off the farm. In this role, you will ensure Smallhold’s mission and values are embodied and acted upon at every level of the organization and in every community we enter.
Responsibilities
- Create and own our product portfolio, roadmap.
- Work with our small Innovations team to build, test and release products in the CPG, ingredients, online retail, direct to consumer and home garden categories/channels.
- Own consumer research, trend analysis, SKU analyses, market research and qualitative research. Be the expert on all food happenings – category trends, consumer attitudes, and competitive offerings.
- Distill and communicate insights. Ask questions that evolve our product strategy and recommend new products.
- Own product development process end-to-end, prioritizing and allocating work, building and tracking timelines, performance metrics, and deadlines, and identifying resource gaps and constraints.
- Work closely with culinary R&D and agriculture consultants/teams to develop delicious recipes that can scale.
- Manage end-to-end product development cycles for new and existing products
- Create and own our SKU/product strategy guidelines, schedule etc.
- Scope new roles, interview, and hire additional members to the PD / R&D teams, leveraging your network to source exceptional hires.
- Validate new equipment, ingredients, products or processes through bench and pilot work.
- Work with current and new suppliers, co-packers and vendors to test new products.
- Work with Food Safety/QA to update master Q&A documents/SOPs with new product Q&A information.
- Systematically push momentum across new product development efforts – simultaneously empathetic to priorities across teams and proactive in maintaining our pace of growth.
Skills & Experience
- Highly organized, structured, and excellent at prioritizing based on company goals.
- A commitment to community-driven agriculture, an ecologically sustainable mindset and a willingness to change and adapt.
- 10+ years progressive experience with project management, working closely with project leaders in engineering, research and development, manufacturing, supply chain, sourcing, sales, channel marketing, marketing communications, packaging, and finance.
- A Bachelor’s Degree or similar experience in a related field (food science, food engineering, product management, project management or related discipline).
- Significant experience developing new food products as well as new product concept definitions, particularly with food that is new to the market. Ideally you possess at least 5 years experience working directly in R&D and Product Development in plant based food, agriculture or produce.
- Rigorous data driven/analytical capabilities and an ability to present data effectively.
- You’re someone who monitors current and new technologies in the CPG and produce space; bonus if you have solid knowledge of culinary R&D, agricultural products, ethical brand and community building.
- Demonstrated understanding of the financial aspects of product development.
- You have an ownership mindset and are a strategic thinker. Setting goals and priorities when appropriate, creating and executing plans, measuring KPIs and metrics, and aligning tactics with key results all comes naturally to you.
- Cross functional experience, preferably in a startup environment.
Application Details
- Location: New York, New York
- Travel: Often
- Commute: To Brooklyn office 2-4 days a week
- Equity Participation
- Healthcare benefits
- 401(k) plan
- Mushrooms: always
Compensation
What is the compensation for the position?
Why You Should Work With Us
This is the place to promote your brand and company culture.
