Director, Research & Development/Innovation

Tasty Brands is a well-established, fast growing national company that is focused on providing great tasting, nutritious food for K12 school foodservice customers and private brands of selected retailers. With a focus on collaboration, best practices, and continuous improvement, we are looking for people who want to join us for a long career and be part of a great success story. Our most successful people are self-starters, work well in collaboration with others, see the big picture and like to win.

We have an outstanding team of motivated professionals who work well together in a fun and team spirit type atmosphere. Our mission is driven by our core values – urgency, accountability, proactivity, teamwork, and integrity. We are looking for the next “great fit” to join our growing team!

Overview

We are looking for a Director of Research and Development for our corporate office. This person is ambitious, a team-player, willing to learn, and is passionate about food within the ever-evolving manufacturing industry. Main responsibilities would include but are not limited to researching and developing new and/or existing menu items, products and processes, and operational procedures. The primary objective is to support Tasty’s QA/QC structure with product development and to optimize ease of execution. This candidate will be exposed to managing day-to-day operations of the corporate headquarters location.

Job Requirements:

Product Development & Innovation

• Lead the ideation, analysis, creation, detailed design and validation of new food item concepts and how they would integrate within the larger Tasty Brands ecosystem and align with consumer trends, regulatory standards and operational capabilities
• Develop strategic and creative new products for retail and K-12 school environments.
• Develop and refine specifications for new and/or existing products.

Project Management

• Manage multiple R&D projects from concept to commercialization ensuring timelines and budget requirements are met
• Collaborate cross functionally with Operations, Sourcing, Sales, and Brand Marketing in communication of technical information, related to new product and existing test programs
• Plan, execute, and evaluate projects while maintaining food safety and regulatory requirements specific to menu development.
• Work alongside multiple departments with all aspects of product roll-out including sourcing, production runs, marketing, creative, training and materials.

Team Leadership and Development

• Manage and lead a team of dedicated R&D professionals to develop and create innovative food ideas for both commercial and school nutrition.
• Provide technical expertise for products in development, new or improvement of existing.

Process/Product Improvement

• Develop and refine manufacturing processes for breaded chicken, focusing on yield improvement, cost reduction, and scalability.
• Provide technical support to resolve product-related issues and implement corrective actions.
• Responsible for resolution of technical issues that arise during the development, production, or product performance based.

Regulatory and Specification Compliance

• Nutritional analysis and calculations using ESHA Genesis nutrition software.
• Determining Child Nutrition contributions within USDA guided School Nutrition programs

Requirements

Qualifications:

• Education: Culinary Degree or Bachelors Degree in food science, food chemistry, nutritional science, or related field.

• Minimum 10 years’ experience in a manufacturing or restaurant back of house setting

• Strong proficiency in Windows and Microsoft Office applications (Outlook, Excel, Word, and PowerPoint)

• Thorough knowledge of food production and processing: culinary knowledge related to equipment, product formulation, and quality control technical troubleshooting

• Must have thorough knowledge of food products, recipes and procedures writing, and food costing

• Basic knowledge of ESHA Genesis nutrition bases computer software

• Understanding of production equipment and services 

• Keeping current with trends, consumer insights, and competitive restaurant/menu strategies

• Requires independent, analytical, and creative work efforts regarding proper procedures, planning and follow-up

• Requires adaptability to handle multiple projects simultaneously while remaining an awareness of completion dates and understanding of management principles, especially of time management

• Ability to travel up to 40% of the time.

• Must have excellent written and verbal communication skills

We are an equal opportunity employer, and we value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability status, or any other basis prohibited by federal, state or local laws.

Benefits

Medical, Dental, Vision, 401(k), 401(k) match, Aflac, PTO, Free life insurance, Paid Holidays, and more.