Brand Manager, Disruptive Innovation – Away From Home Equipment

Here at Kraft Heinz, we grow our people to grow our business, because we believe that great people make great companies. When you join our table, you can expect access to an array of holistic wellness benefits* and perks, including medical, dental and vision coverage, 7% 401(k) matching, Business Resource Groups (BRGs) to help foster diversity, inclusion, and belonging for all employees, an industry-leading total rewards package that emphasizes a high discretionary bonus.

*Benefits begin 30 days after hire for hourly employees, and immediately upon hire for salaried employees.

Get a peek into life here at Kraft Heinz through our Instagram and TikTok channels!

Brand Manager, Disruptive Innovation AFH Equipment at a glance…

This role will sit in the Global Growth Office on the Disruptive Innovation team and be responsible for pioneering new agile innovation methodologies to bring consumer driven innovation to market. The Brand Manager, Disruptive Innovation will be a key member of a small, focused cross functional team to bring new products and new business models within the Away from Home (Kraft Heinz’s Foodservice Business Unit, also known as AFH) equipment space by developing prototypes and implementing agile in-market tests to refine our offering and business model innovations in pursuit of setting up a future scaled offering for success.

This position requires a candidate that is a self-starter, strategic thinker, creative problem solver and driver of results. While it has been around for a few years within Kraft Heinz, this approach to disruptive innovation is still new to many within our organization, so the individual needs to be flexible, have a growth mindset, and be comfortable with ambiguity. This role will require a high level of collaboration with our AFH business unit and our external partners – both of whom are critical to long-term project success. This individual will support the end-to-end direction for our Disruptive Innovation PODs focused on AFH Equipment, from helping to craft our vision, the exploration of new ideas / concepts, distillation of our innovation pipeline, building out the product or business model, all the way through in-market testing and product refinement before it is handed back to our AFH BU partners to scale. If you are ready to roll up your sleeves in this dynamic role, team, and space, we want to hear from you!

What's on the menu?

• Leading a top AFH Equipment initiative with support of external agency partners and a cross-functional POD of dedicated Kraft Heinz resources that serve as core team

• Lead and supporting key AFH Equipment innovation initiatives including: strategic vision building, new innovation platform exploration, pipeline creation, and concept / proposition development ensuring alignment with business objectives

• Oversee the execution of the innovation strategy by collaborating with cross-functional teams, including culinary, R&D, consumer insights, quality, legal, engineering, operations, sales, and finance, to bring concepts to reality.

• Own and design a fit-to-win capability to continue to build out and rethink how we innovate at Kraft Heinz and within the AFH space

• Develop and implement methods to Test, Learn and Iterate solutions with AFH customers and our consumers

• Develop the marketing strategy for owned innovations

• Lead test market launch and support building plan to scale in collaboration with AFH BU

• Champion for Design Thinking and Scrum methodologies across KHC

• Lead the P&L, competitive analysis and customer sell-in materials (in partnership with business unit)

Recipe for Success – apply now if this sounds like you!

• Bachelor’s degree in business, marketing, or a related field is required. An MBA with a focus on marketing is preferred, though candidates with equivalent experience will be considered.

• At least 5 years in marketing, product innovation, or brand management. Strong preference for experience in developing, launching, and managing products from concept to market within the consumer goods sector.

• Experience working in, or adjacent to, Foodservice / Away from Home settings, with a deep understanding of the unique challenges and characteristics of different types of Foodservice customers (e.g., commercial, leisure / travel, education, healthcare, etc.)

• Consumer centric & growth mindset – learn fast vs. avoid failure

• Prior or relevant experience working in Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) & Innovation a plus

• Prior experience converting insights into actionable strategies

• Experience with Design Thinking, Lean Start Up & Agile Teams (SCRUM) a plus

• Experience in agency management & cross-functional team management; self confident individual who can work collaboratively

• Strong personal motivation in fast-paced, often ambiguous environment, with a bias for action

• Demonstrated ability to influence teams and experience handling multiple collaborators

• Strong “big picture” perspective, while also delivering the innovation initiative at hand

• Outstanding verbal, written and interpersonal communications skills to internal/external partners

• Excellent strategic and analytical skills; ability to use syndicated data sources to assess competitive space, bringing forth insights and recommendations to integrate into overall strategy

• Ability to simplify complex problems and make decisions quickly

• Excellent organizational and project management skills

• Understanding of Financial P&Ls and building business cases

Work Environment & Schedule

The role can be based in Chicago or Toronto and will be hybrid 3 days per week in office.