Director Culinary Services

Position Summary:

The Director, Culinary Services, is a senior leadership role that will champion our Food Innovation Services, technical expertise, and commercial growth for Ventura Foods and its customers. Reporting directly to the VP, this position serves as a lead culinary interface between our Customers and Sales, Product Development, Customer Success, and Marketing teams. The Director will play a lead role in evolving the company’s innovation services, strengthening customer relationships, and ensuring alignment with our customers’ business objectives. The ideal candidate would combines culinary vision with business acumen to accelerate speed-to-market, inspire customers, and drive their revenue growth. This role is a "player-coach" and will provide leadership to three direct reports. This position is Hybrid based from our Fort Worth, TX. location.  

Major Duties and Responsibilities:

• Provides menu and product innovation services to key customers in multiple business channels. Develops menu concepts and products. Collaborates and/or leads cross-functional teams to present these solutions to customers. Plays a key role in the evolution of our Vista Food Innovation Service. 
• Provides leadership, guides individual development plans/career growth, and ensures performance standards of three direct culinary reports.  Hires open positions directly reporting to this role. 
• Is the culinary site leader for this location. Owns and manages the kitchen event calendar and culinary execution those events. Ensures the kitchen is cleaned, maintained, and organized. Ensures the kitchen possesses a Food Protection Manager Certification and meets or exceeds state regulation code for a commercial food service space. 
• Leads culinary support for company and industry events where culinary execution and food service is required. Includes developing concepts, products, menus, execution plans, and communication. 
• Document all customer project activity in the Salesforce Velocity CRM system to capture the value and investment provided to customers. 
• Employs and/or develops digital tools such as videos for menu concepts, product category training, social media, YouTube, and direct to customer engagements. 

Education and Experience:

• Bachelor’s degree in Culinary Arts, Food Science, or related field is preferred. AA/AOC Culinary degree, professional certificate, or recognized apprenticeship program with equivalent executive-level experience in culinary leadership and product development will be considered.
• 10 + years of progressive culinary experience in restaurant operations, food manufacturer, or culinary sales.  \
• 3-5 years experience in a food manufacturer role is preferred.
• Ability to travel up to 40% for customer meetings and industry events.
• Experience includes hands-on kitchen operations, menu innovation, product development, direct customer engagement, team leadership, commercialization, and turning strategy into business growth. 
• Deep knowledge of food safety, product development, regulatory, product commercialization, trends, and marketing strategies. 

Knowledge and Skills:

• CEC and/or CRC certifications are preferred. 
• Food Protection Manager certification is preferred. 
• Experience in collaborating and/or leading cross-functional teams to create customer solutions. 
• Proven success in building customer relationships and translating culinary trends into customer menu solutions. 
• Strong business acumen with ability to connect culinary innovation to commercial growth.
• Exceptional presentation, communication, and negotiation skills.
• Passionate about delivering customer value through food innovation.
• Strategic thinker with customer-centric approach to culinary innovation.
• Inspirational communicator with executive presence.
• Skilled in project management and cross-functional collaboration.
• Relationship-driven leader with strong commercial instincts.
• Kitchen operations expert – fine dining, high-volume food service, casual, fast-casual, QSR, and retail food service. 
• Working knowledge and use of digital/video capability is preferred.