Product Quality Manager

We are currently looking for a Technical Specialist / Product Manager to join our Thrapston site, our fruit packing site in Northamptonshire. You will work as part of our technical department and will be responsible for ensuring all our suppliers and growers produce is of the highest standard and fully compliant with both industry and Morrison’s standards.

You will be the frontline representative of the business to drive end to end quality standards, ensuring that all product delivered into site and then delivered into depot meets agreed specifications. Ensuring you are seen as a subject matter expert in your field to build strong and lasting relationships with our suppliers, ensuring you champion customer focus throughout the supply chain.

You will be responsible for:

• Ensure suppliers and growers meet relevant quality standards and conform to food safety, legality and ethical requirements
• Provide financial yield analysis and operational efficiencies data to support procurement decisions
• Collate and approve category supplier due diligence data
• Reducing stock working capital, depot rejections, complaints & refunds and site rejections
• Provide expertise, training and excellent communication of product quality for a specific product area in a Manufacturing site
• Auditing, approving and liaising with suppliers/growers, providing the site team, technical manager and trader with detailed insight on raw material quality, flagging potential issues and supporting interpretation of specifications
• Recommend to site which stock should be used to maximise yield
• Provide commercially impactful technical expertise and advice to improve profitability in this category
• Partner with Buyers on developing sourcing strategy and supply base, also understanding next deliveries based on season and weather impact
• Manage difficult seasons or periods without compromising product safety or quality
• Escalation of potential safety, quality, legality or ethical issues to Central & Site Technical teams and Buyers (as appropriate)
• Review grading results and monitor produce quality to feedback to producers

We’re looking for someone who has previously worked in a similar role, understanding food production as a whole but with expert knowledge of fruit. You'll ideally come from a technical/quality background, understanding agriculture, audit of suppliers, relevant standards (AFS, Global Gap, BRC) and have intermediate food safety knowledge and HACCP. You’ll have a solid commercial understanding, with demonstrable experience of enhancing supplier and yield performance and how this impacts the wider business.

We’re also looking for someone who can:

• Build and maintain a network of contacts both internal and external with the ability to influence
• Leadership skills, promoting a strong sense of teamwork and training hourly colleagues
• Experience working in a complex and fast paced environment
• Share ideas and findings in a clear direct way both internally and externally
• Ability to use data to drive intelligent decision making and influence future seasons