Director Category Marketing

The Marzetti Company • Columbus, OH

3d

About The Position

The Director of Category Marketing leads the development and execution of category strategies for Marzetti Foodservice to deliver sustainable growth and profitability. The role is responsible for category planning, P&L and margin management, portfolio strategy, integrated business planning and forecasting, value engineering, innovation, and category and brand marketing for assigned categories.

The Director partners with Sales, Customer Marketing, Finance, Revenue Management, End-to-End Planning, R&D/Culinary, and Operations to set category priorities and align the organization around annual and long-range objectives. The role leads the Category Marketing team and provides recommendations and leadership on portfolio, innovation, margin, and investment decisions.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Business, or a related field.
• 10 or more years of progressive experience in CPG marketing, category, brand, or product management, or related roles.
• Strong financial and business acumen, including P&L management and forecasting experience.
• Demonstrated experience leading strategic planning, portfolio management, innovation, and commercialization.
• Experience using secondary, syndicated, and custom research to inform strategy and leading agency partners to deliver business and marketing objectives.
• Proven ability to lead cross-functional teams and influence effectively without direct authority.
• Strong analytical and decision-making skills, including the ability to translate insights into action and work effectively in a fast-paced, evolving business environment.
• Excellent storytelling and presentation skills.
• Collaborative, growth-oriented leadership, with strong ownership, curiosity, and passion for food, customers, and innovation.

Nice To Haves

• MBA.
• Foodservice experience.

Responsibilities

• Lead annual and long-term category strategies, defining growth priorities and where-to-play/how-to-win choices.
• Translate category, customer, consumer, and competitive insights into opportunities, risks, and recommendations.
• Establish category objectives, key initiatives, and measures of success.
• Partner with Customer Marketing and Sales to translate category priorities into customer and channel opportunities.
• Own financial performance for branded and customer SKU categories across volume, revenue, mix, margin, and profitability.
• Partner with Finance, Trade, and Pricing to establish category margin targets and decision thresholds.
• Lead portfolio profitability, pricing and mix, and margin-improvement decisions.
• Oversee category marketing budgets.
• Lead Marketing's category perspective within the integrated business planning process.
• Own business assumptions behind the demand outlook and align Sales and Customer Marketing inputs with Demand Planning.
• Assess capacity, supply, and inventory implications and make category, customer prioritization, and portfolio recommendations as needed.
• Partner with Supply Chain on constraints, risks, and longer-term capacity requirements, including capital and business case development.
• Ensure innovation, customer initiatives, and portfolio changes are appropriately represented in business plans.
• Develop and lead the category innovation and renovation funnel.
• Establish business cases, value propositions, and financial expectations for category innovation.
• Lead cross-functional alignment for category-driven projects through Stage Gate and commercialization, and approve customer Stage Gate projects.
• Partner with Customer Marketing on customer-driven opportunities to ensure alignment with strategy, margin expectations, and portfolio priorities.
• Develop portfolio assortment strategy and SKU productivity while balancing customer needs, operational complexity, capacity, and financial performance.
• Lead SKU optimization and rationalization decisions.
• Identify and prioritize value engineering, quality improvement, renovation opportunities, and regulatory requirements with cross-functional teams.
• Lead category architecture, brand positioning, and value propositions.
• Partner with Customer Marketing to translate category strategies into channel and customer activation, and guide development of selling tools and agency support.
• Monitor category, competitive, and marketplace trends to identify risks and growth opportunities.
• Build and nurture a high-performing Category Marketing team.
• Create clarity around priorities, decision rights, and accountability.
• Communicate category performance, opportunities, risks, and recommendations to senior leadership.
• Build general-management, financial, and category-management capabilities across the team.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Director