Head of Innovation

About The Role

Join the Samworth Brothers Team and become part of our dynamic family!

At Samworth Brothers, we genuinely care about our colleagues and strive to create an engaging environment that values your unique contributions. We are committed to your success and offer a range of exceptional benefits that we believe supports your life and personal aspirations:

• Enhanced pension scheme
• Private health scheme
• Employee discount scheme
• Experience annual pay reviews
• Profit related pay
• Unlock your potential through training and growth opportunities

The Opportunity

The Head of Innovation will set a clear vision and strategy for new product development that aligns with the company’s broader business objectives, market opportunities, and long-term growth goals. You will ensure the NPD strategy complements the company’s overall mission and competitive positioning in the market. The successful candidate will also have a strong commercial focus, with extensive experience in writing capital business cases that deliver incremental net sales and gross margin growth.

Key Responsibilities:

• Set and execute the product development and innovation strategy for our branded and own brand portfolio ensuring alignment with the category plans and aspirations for growth. This includes creating a strategic roadmap that prioritises high-impact projects and ensures a continuous flow of innovative products into the pipeline.
• Ensuring the product flow is underpinned by seamless use of technologies and processes which deliver outputs in a timely manner, supporting the evolution and refining of processes as business-as-usual activity.
• Lead the creation and management of the brand innovation pipeline that inspires the customer, ensuring that new product ideas are consistently aligned with partners brand identity, values, and positioning. Focus on fostering innovation that strengthens the brand, enhances customer engagement, and delivers sustainable competitive advantage.
• Ensure future focussed positioning for the category - staying ahead of trends, using your passion for food and food innovation to “predict” trends or direction of the market. Using customer insights and data to inform your thinking.
• Lead and own the end-to-end product development process from idea generation, concept development, and feasibility through to commercialisation.
• Develop and execute strategies to commercialise new products, ensuring alignment with customer needs, market trends, and business objectives.
• Proactively lead the development of capital business cases for new product initiatives, clearly articulating the commercial rationale and return on investment (ROI).
• Analyse potential business opportunities and their financial impact, including sales forecasts, margin analysis, and capital expenditure requirements.

The Ideal Candidate

We believe that success is built upon collaboration and diverse perspectives. At Samworth Brothers, we welcome candidates who are passionate about working together to achieve greatness. As a valued member of our team, you will bring the following skills and experience:

• A food based degree of equivalent experience. Proven experience (8+ years) in a senior NPD role within the ready meals or FMCG sector.
• Demonstrated ability to provide highly effective leadership in a large, complex environment with a focus on putting people at the heart of the operation.
• Proven experience of leading cultural transformation and inspiring others fostering a culture of continuous improvement and innovation.
• Strong strategic planning skills, with the ability to align plans with business, its customers and longer-term strategic intents of the site.
• Strong commercial acumen with a track record of writing capital business cases resulting in sales and margin growth.
• Extensive knowledge of food manufacturing processes, technologies, and regulatory requirements.
• Demonstrated success in leading product innovation and commercialising new products from concept to market launch.

We also want you to thrive in an engaging and inclusive work culture where you will have the opportunity to take on personal accountability and take pride in your work. We encourage positive communication, and the building of strong collaborative relationships is essential to every role.

Join us at Samworth Brothers, where you'll be more than just a team member – you'll be an integral part of our thriving family. Apply today and embark on an exciting journey with us!

About Us

We are a fourth-generation family business producing high quality own-label products for many of the UK’s best-known retailers along with our own brands including Ginsters, Soreen, Higgidy, Dickinson & Morris, Urban Eat, West Cornwall Pasty Company and Walker & Son. We employ over 10,000 people in well-invested modern food manufacturing sites around the country.

At Samworth Brothers we take pride in our family feel within our businesses and work together to make things happen. We can offer you the stability of a wider group as well as the opportunities that that offers if you wish to progress your career with us. We are family and we would like to invite you to be part of that and support our teams in delivering great products to all of our customers.

Samworth Brothers do not engage with unlicensed gangmasters or third parties. Samworth Brothers will NEVER ask you for money in order to provide you with employment. If you are in any doubt, please contact an official Samworth Brothers representative.