Associate Director, BU Sales Planning

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At Lactalis in the USA, we're committed to providing meaningful opportunities for our people to learn, grow, and thrive-whether you're just starting your journey with us or looking to take the next step in your career. From day one, we offer the tools and support to help you succeed.

As the world leader in dairy, Lactalis is a family-owned company with over 85,000 pragmatic and ambitious professionals across the globe. Each day, we're proud to produce award-winning dairy products that bring people together.

In the US, we proudly offer an unrivaled house of beloved brands, including Galbani Italian cheeses and ricotta, President specialty cheeses and butters, Kraft natural and grated cheeses, Breakstone's cottage cheese, Cracker Barrel, Black Diamond cheddar, and Parmalat milk. Our yogurt portfolio includes siggi's, Stonyfield Organic, Brown Cow, Oui, Yoplait, Go-Gurt, :ratio, Green Mountain Creamery, and Mountain High, along with a growing family of ethnic favorites like Karoun, Gopi, and Arz.

At Lactalis, we live by our core values-Ambition, Engagement, and Simplicity. We foster a workplace where innovation thrives, diverse perspectives are celebrated, and everyone's unique background and ideas are valued.

Even if you don't meet every qualification, we encourage you to apply. We want to hear about your PASSION, your STORY, and how your EXPERTISE can help us shape the future of dairy.

From your PASSION to ours

This critical role has responsibility for executing the Business Unit's (BU) strategic agenda with field sales teams in order to maximize impact with our customers. The Sales Planning Associate Director is the expert on the customer execution of the Natural Cheese & Snacking Cheese category sales strategies and voice of Field Sales within the BU. This position collaborates cross-functionally with Marketing, Finance, Demand Planning, and Supply Chain to ensure delivery of targets. Main responsibilities include but are not limited to: trade management and efficiency, distribution recommendations and new item sell-in, commercialization, merchandising strategy execution, driving forecast accuracy, and sales process improvements to help drive profitable revenue growth. This individual must be highly motivated, consistently operate with an ownership mentality, and be able to thrive in a fast-paced, complex environment.

From your EXPERTISE to ours

• Develop strong cross functional relationships with Category Marketing, Demand Planning, Supply Chain, Finance, Revenue Management, and most importantly, Field Sales teams to deliver targets
• Act as the main liaison between the Business Unit and the Field Sales teams to ensure strong communication and alignment between the two functions. Represent the needs of the field when interacting cross functionally within the BU
• Translate the BU brand vision and strategy into clearly articulated category fundamentals
• Partner with Field Sales teams to develop and execute robust proposals, combining brand strategies with customer strategies
• Lead all annual sales planning activities for the Natural cheese & Snacking cheese categories
• Own communication routines with Field Sales teams (often involving 100+ participants) to highlight BU priorities and changes to brand strategies and tactics. Ensure the strategies are executed accordingly to plan at a customer level
• Operate with business owner mentality; understand and apply category analytics to deliver key insights and business recommendations on merchandising, assortment, pricing, and promotion
• Deliver sales forecasting accuracy in partnership with Demand, Supply, and Field Sales through monthly demand forecasting routines and identification of key volume drivers
• Actively participate in commercialization and be the voice of Field Sales throughout the process; track all new item commercialization against customer reset timing and support Field Sales teams with new item sell-in activity at retailers
• Analyze competitive landscape to help maintain an optimal go-to-market strategy and react dynamically to competitive threats

From your STORY to ours

• Bachelor's degree; Business Administration, Finance, or related field. Marketing/Sales concentration preferred.
• 7+ years of experience in Sales, Category Management, or Marketing
• Previous experience in the CPG industry and strong understanding of the US retail landscape preferred
• Excellent analytic and problem-solving capabilities
• Minimum 3 years of experience using syndicated / panel data
• Strategic Planning
• Trade management/optimization
• Competitive analysis
• Integrated business planning
• Budget creation and management
• Organizational agility and strong influential leadership across multiple cross functional teams
• Strong verbal, written, and interpersonal communications skills
• Outstanding organizational and project management skills
• Proficiency in Excel & Power Point required
• This position requires up to 25% travel, including both internal and customer meetings depending on business needs.

At Lactalis, we offer a comprehensive Total Rewards Program with a variety of affordable benefits and coverage options. We support insurance costs significantly, contribute generously to retirement plans, and offer Paid Time Off from day one. We are committed to your professional growth, providing training and development opportunities, including Education Reimbursement. Join us and grow your career.

Lactalis is an equal employment opportunity employer. We will not discriminate against applicants with regard to any legally-recognized basis including, but not limited to: veteran status, race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, marital status, sexual orientation, and physical or mental disabilities. Further, any division of the Company that is an Affirmative Action Employer will comply with all related legal obligations.