The Senior Procurement Category Manager has the following main responsibilities:

• Supply Chain: Building and maintaining a robust and transparent national and regional grocery and protein supply chain including but not limited to coordinating with all suppliers to ensure proper supply, quality, contracts, food safety, ingredient specifications, onboarding protocols, compliance, and pricing in relation to all grocery and protein items. Creating ingredient supply resiliency to reduce risk while scaling and to offset dynamic market conditions.
• Project Management: All national non-produce ingredient projects, including innovation and ethos improvements, need to be scoped, designed, tracked, and delivered to maintain our operational rollout timelines in a systematic way.
• Transparency: Coordinating with our Brand/Content teams about who our sources are and what information we should capture and share with our guests. Synchronizing with the Value Chain team to fold in local sourcing opportunities when they present themselves.
• Food Ethos & Sustainability: Driving unprompted improvements to our company sustainability and quality sourcing objectives. Being a subject matter expert on current and future sustainability issues surrounding our grocery and protein ingredients, including both upstream and downstream supply chain effects. Animal welfare expertise related to proteins is relevant, including having the knowledge and relationships to deal with third party organizations who advocate for welfare improvements.
• Negotiations: Relentlessly pursuing supplier program improvements to optimize value when sourcing our quality ingredients, in the lens of our Win, Win, Win core value.
• Delivering on period end reporting (credits, subs, KPI metrics, COGS).
• Supporting, training and mentoring new procurement category managers as needed. Other categories assigned as needed.

Expected Deliverables

• Be the ‘business owner’ for your category/sub-category, working autonomously and collaboratively while possessing a complete understanding of variables to build supply resiliency.
• Expand the quality, animal welfare standards, and efficiency improvements of our current Poultry, Dairy & Egg program.
• Drive multiple Food Ethos grocery ingredient improvements and resiliency while holding commodity costs at or below current targets.
• Source and deliver new ingredients, including finding multiple options, for new menu initiatives at or below the forecasted price point target. Implement a formal vendor onboarding system for current and new suppliers, including the review of our terms and conditions.
• Analyze upstream opportunities from a supply chain standpoint for select ingredients to create operational wins while maintaining our quality and food ethos standards.
• Use of a project management system to display timelines and track milestones.
• Optimize the flow of product from the producer to first receiver to minimize freight inefficiencies and inventory risks.

Desired Traits

• Desire to build an unparalleled food supply chain that supports farmers, sweetgreen, and our customers
• Create win/win/win scenarios across the supply chain by tracking and organizing all of the information required to drive success
• Ability to successfully handle many projects at once
• Excellent communication skills, ability to communicate clearly across multiple channels and supply chain partners
• Proficient time management, task management, and project prioritization skills
• Place the team’s success before individual accolades
• Ability to deeply connect with farmers, growers, and producers of all types

Desired Experience

• The experienced candidate will have a minimum of 5 years category management and sales experience with exposure to supply chain management, all within a high-volume, multi-site/distribution/retail/wholesale/food industry and/or meat purveyor environment
• Knowledge of sustainable farming and familiarity with general soil health principles and regenerative practices including but not limited to: soil biology, cover cropping, soil organic matter, carbon sequestration, animal feed standards, etc.
• Bachelor's degree with technical background in Environmental Health, Food Science, Agriculture, or Supply Chain related course of study or equivalent experience
• Experience moving perishable product through distribution channels
• Familiarity with food-related certifications and the requirements for a grower to achieve various certifications (especially food safety certification and animal welfare certifications)
• Procurement & Supply Chain Software experience: Source to Contract, SRM, Data Analytics, ArrowStream, Foodlogiq, CrunchTime, or other foodservice contract management technology. Working knowledge of ERP/MRP Systems.

What you'll get:

• Three different medical plans to suit your and your family's needs
• Dental and Vision insurance
• Flexible PTO plan
• 401k; company match of 50% up to 3% of employee contribution
• 5 months paid family leave; we believe in fully supporting new parents
• Employee HSA and FSA
• Complimentary greens
• An opportunity to make a real impact on the people around you, both by growing them and by connecting them to real food
• To live the sweetlife and celebrate your passion + purpose
• A collaborative team of people who live our core values and have your back
• A clear career path with opportunities for development, both personally and professionally
• Free sweetgreen swag

Come join the sweetlife!

What you'll get:

• Highly competitive pay + bonus plan
• Three different medical plans to suit your and your family's needs
• Dental and Vision insurance
• Flexible PTO plan
• 401k program
• Employee HSA and FSA
• Complimentary greens
• An opportunity to make a real impact on the people around you, both by growing them and by connecting them to real food
• To live the sweetlife and celebrate your passion + purpose
• A collaborative team of people who live our core values and have your back
• A clear career path with opportunities for development, both personally and professionally
• Free sweetgreen swag

Come join the sweetlife!

About sweetgreen

sweetgreen is on a mission to build healthier communities by connecting people to real food. We passionately believe that real food should be convenient and accessible to everyone. Every day in each sweetgreen, our 3,500 team members make food from scratch, using fresh ingredients and produce delivered that morning. And in our local communities, we’re committed to leaving people better than we found them. We’re in the business of feeding people, and we’re out to change what that means.

sweetgreen provides equal opportunities for everyone that works for us and everyone that applies to join our team, without regard to sex or gender, gender identity, gender expression, age, race, religious creed, color, national origin, ancestry, pregnancy, physical or mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, sexual orientation, any service, past, present, or future, in the uniformed services of the United States (military or veteran status), or any other consideration protected by federal, state, or local law.

sweetgreen participates in the federal government's E-Verify program to determine employment eligibility. To learn more about the E-Verify program, please click here.