Based in Mount Prospect, IL, Mizkan America is a subsidiary of the Mizkan Group, a global, family-owned company that has been Bringing Flavor to Life™ for over 220 years. As one of the leading makers of vinegars, condiments, and sauces in the United States, Mizkan America maintains 12 manufacturing facilities that serve the retail, food service, specialty-Asian, and food-ingredient trade channels. We are committed to following our two core principles: continuously challenging the status quo and delivering only the finest products for our customers. Our leadership seeks out, embraces, and implements ideas for improvement from all its employees. Transparency and accountability are two key factors that drive our company’s overall management approach.

We are looking for people who are seeking to deliver their best so that we can deliver ours. Above all, we’re dedicated to maximizing the potential of our greatest assets—our team members. That’s reflected in our ongoing commitment to recruit, develop, reward, and retain our talented, multicultural workforce. We hope to see you as part of our team’s future success!

COMMENTS: This job description reflects the assignment of essential functions. It does not prescribe or restrict the tasks that may be assigned.

SUMMARY: The Sr. Associate Brand Manager for Mizkan America provides an exciting opportunity to support the Mizkan America Marketing teams across our branded portfolio including Ragu, Bertolli, Holland House, Nakano, Mizkan and Angostura Bitters. This unique position will support the Marketing, Innovation, and Insights & Analytics (CI&A) teams, reporting directly to the Senior Brand Director. This individual is expected to have strong analytical skills and be proficient in insights/ data mining, synthesis, and consolidation; surfacing critical insights at the service of actionable recommendations that will propel the business forward. This individual will have the unique opportunity to work on a diverse range of projects, from quantifying the size of the prize for innovation to identifying drivers of brand growth, optimizing the marketing/ media mix, and crafting category assessments.



ESSENTIAL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:


* Manage ad-hoc projects as needed – support marketing, innovation and CI&A teams on a project-basis prioritized against business needs
* Synthesize data & insights from a number of different sources & uncover actionable Insights - make fact-based recommendations about category, brands, competitors, category, customer, or consumer trends to enhance brand equity and business performance.
* Optimize and evolve tools to improve business analytics – utilize and optimize tools and resources that will help monitor brand’s (and sublines) in an efficient manner. Enable the identification of opportunities and in-market performance gaps, optimization of executions, and tracking of business KPIs.
* Support development of Brand’s Long-Term Growth Strategy – Partner with brand leads to support the development and optimization of the long-term strategic direction for Mizkan’s brands leveraging and creating proprietary models and overlaying deep understanding of consumer needs, trends, competitive landscape, unmet opportunities, and category dynamics.
* Support the development of both close-in & “blue sky” innovation – partner with brand teams and the Director of Innovation in the development of innovation platforms rooted in sizable opportunities and “right to win”. Driving opportunity sizes and deriving distinctive PODs.
* Support the development of best-in-class launch plans for innovation – partner with project leads to help inform the go to market of our innovation with best-in-class plans (media through shelf). Ensuring synchronization of omni and trade activities. Maximizing efficiencies while delivering against strategic objectives.
* Deepen business drivers, category and competitive knowledge - become a subject expert on brand and category knowledge inclusive of, yet not exclusive to, the following: brand levers, drivers, competitive threats, and trade executions. Have deep understanding of the business dynamics to help inform actionable and relevant recommendations that will have a direct impact in the business.
* Support MA’s journey towards Commercial excellence – work closely with strategic customer teams to build sell-in stories, and help build brand strategies to support distribution, packaging, shelving and merchandising strategies and plans.
* Demonstrate strong collaboration across relevant stakeholders – effectively collaborate with cross functional teams, embrace the Mizkan Values and ensure open and trust-worthy relationships



EDUCATION, EXPERIENCE, AND QUALIFICATIONS:


* Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing, Business, or a related major is required
* MBA in Marketing is preferred
* Minimum of 5 years of consumer-packaged goods experience within the food industry is highly desirable
* Experience working for a food company or consumer packaged goods is required
* Expertise in branded products, agency management, and product development is essential
* 1 to 2 years of prior sales experience is a plus
* Strong analytical skills
* Proficiency in MS Office Suite is essential
* Able to identify and anticipate business needs
* Must multi-task and prioritize accordingly
* Able to pivot and optimize as needed without compromising timelines and quality
* Must be a resourceful, creative, and independent thinker
* Able to integrate and synthesize several data sources and derive business implications
* Must leverage data and insights to generate cohesive strategic recommendations
* Able to create tools that will enable the monitoring of the day-to-day business performance
* Able to drive and ignite effective communication across teams and cross-functionally
* Must be able to put together executive decks for Senior Leadership
* Must show a “can do attitude”
* Must be able to prioritize and complete multiple projects on schedule and on budget
* Strong interpersonal and communication skills are required
* Creative thinking, flexibility, persuasiveness, and good marketing instincts are important characteristics
* Some travel is required
* No relocation is available





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