Maintenance & Facilities Manager

Dr. Squatch•Brea, CA

14h•$120,000 - $145,000•Onsite

About The Position

Dr. Squatch is scaling one of the largest in-house cold-process soap and deodorant manufacturing operations in the country. As we continue to grow our Brea manufacturing plant, we are looking for a high-caliber Maintenance & Facilities Manager who can lead equipment reliability, facilities readiness, maintenance execution, and continuous improvement across a fast-paced consumer products manufacturing environment. This role is responsible for leading the maintenance and facilities function for a plant that manufactures deodorant and cold-process soap. The ideal candidate is a hands-on, resilient, systems-driven leader who can operate with urgency, build structure where needed, develop mechanics, improve uptime, and help create a world-class manufacturing environment. This is not a role for someone who simply reacts to breakdowns. We are looking for a leader who can build a reliability culture, strengthen preventive maintenance systems, own UpKeep CMMS execution, improve spare parts discipline, and partner closely with Production, Engineering, Quality, and Safety to deliver strong operational performance.

Requirements

High school diploma or equivalent required.
Minimum of 3 years of maintenance leadership experience in a manufacturing environment.
Experience leading maintenance technicians, mechanics, contractors, or facilities support teams.
Strong working knowledge of mechanical, electrical, pneumatic, hydraulic, and utility systems.
Ability to read and interpret mechanical drawings, electrical schematics, hydraulic diagrams, pneumatic diagrams, equipment manuals, and technical documentation.
Experience managing preventive maintenance programs and maintenance work order systems.
Experience using a CMMS, preferably UpKeep.
Strong troubleshooting, prioritization, and problem-solving skills.
Experience managing maintenance budgets, contractor work, repair costs, and spare parts.
Strong communication skills with the ability to influence across departments.
Ability to operate with urgency in a fast-paced, high-growth manufacturing environment.
Strong commitment to safety, GMPs, housekeeping, and regulatory compliance.

Nice To Haves

Bachelor’s degree, technical degree, trade certification, or equivalent experience in engineering, maintenance, facilities, industrial technology, or a related field.
Experience in consumer products, personal care, food, beverage, cosmetics, or regulated manufacturing environments.
Experience with FDA, GMP, SQF, HACCP, OSHA, environmental, and local regulatory standards.
Experience with cold-process soap, deodorant, packaging, batching, filling, utilities, or high-volume manufacturing equipment.
Experience leading maintenance in a startup, scale-up, or rapidly growing manufacturing environment.
Familiarity with Los Angeles County or Southern California industrial building requirements, permitting, contractor management, and facility compliance.
Bilingual English and Spanish strongly preferred.
Lean manufacturing, Six Sigma, reliability, or maintenance planning experience preferred.

Responsibilities

Lead the day-to-day maintenance function across production equipment, utilities, facilities, and supporting infrastructure.
Own equipment reliability strategy for deodorant and cold-process soap manufacturing operations.
Drive uptime, reduce unplanned downtime, and improve maintenance response time through strong planning, root cause analysis, and disciplined execution.
Establish, maintain, and continuously improve preventive maintenance and predictive maintenance programs.
Ensure maintenance work is completed safely, correctly, and with proper documentation.
Lead troubleshooting efforts for mechanical, electrical, pneumatic, hydraulic, utility, and facility-related issues.
Partner with Production leadership to prioritize work that supports schedule attainment, line efficiency, safety, and product quality.
Build a culture where breakdowns are investigated, root causes are addressed, and repeat failures are eliminated.
Serve as the site owner for UpKeep CMMS.
Ensure all equipment assets, PMs, work orders, spare parts, and maintenance history are accurately maintained in UpKeep.
Use UpKeep to improve maintenance planning, scheduling, accountability, and reporting.
Develop and track KPIs such as PM completion, work order closure rate, downtime trends, mean time to repair, repeat failures, spare parts usage, and labor allocation.
Train mechanics and maintenance team members on proper CMMS usage and documentation expectations.
Use data from UpKeep to identify reliability gaps, recurring equipment issues, and continuous improvement opportunities.
Create a disciplined work order process that improves visibility, prioritization, follow-through, and communication with production stakeholders.
Oversee the maintenance and reliability of plant facilities, building systems, utilities, and supporting infrastructure.
Ensure the site remains safe, clean, functional, audit-ready, and production-ready.
Manage facility-related projects, repairs, contractors, and service providers.
Support facility needs related to production expansion, equipment installation, layout changes, utilities, compressed air, HVAC, electrical, plumbing, docks, lighting, and general building upkeep.
Ensure facilities work is completed in compliance with applicable regulatory, safety, environmental, and building requirements.
Act as a key advisor on facility improvements, equipment upgrades, new installations, and operational readiness.
Lead maintenance and facilities work with a safety-first mindset.
Ensure maintenance activities comply with OSHA, GMP, FDA, SQF, HACCP, environmental, and site safety requirements as applicable.
Partner with EH&S, Quality, and Operations to ensure equipment and facility conditions support a safe and compliant manufacturing environment.
Ensure LOTO, hot work, confined space, contractor safety, machine guarding, electrical safety, and other critical safety programs are followed.
Identify and correct unsafe equipment conditions, facility hazards, and maintenance-related risks.
Support incident investigations, corrective actions, and sustainable risk-reduction initiatives.
Maintain high housekeeping standards within maintenance areas, shops, storage rooms, and utility spaces.
Estimate, schedule, and control maintenance labor, materials, contractor work, and project expenses.
Own spare parts strategy, inventory accuracy, critical spares, and storeroom organization.
Ensure parts are available for critical equipment while managing cost, turns, obsolete inventory, and purchasing discipline.
Partner with Plant Direct to manage vendors, service contracts, repair costs, and capital needs.
Support capital planning for equipment replacement, facility upgrades, reliability improvements, and capacity expansion.
Coordinate planned shutdowns, maintenance windows, and annual maintenance activities with minimal disruption to production.
Lead, coach, and develop maintenance technicians, mechanics, leads, and support personnel.
Set clear expectations for safety, quality of work, urgency, communication, documentation, and ownership.
Build a high-accountability maintenance culture rooted in professionalism, pride, and follow-through.
Assess skill gaps and create training plans for mechanical, electrical, troubleshooting, fabrication, PM execution, CMMS usage, and safety compliance.
Develop team capability so the department becomes less reactive and more proactive over time.
Lead by example on the floor with humility, urgency, composure, and high standards.
Create strong relationships with Production, Quality, Engineering, Warehouse, and Safety teams.
Maintain an active continuous improvement roadmap for maintenance and facilities.
Use data, downtime analysis, operator feedback, and maintenance history to prioritize improvement work.
Support lean manufacturing, 5S, standard work, reliability-centered maintenance, and root cause problem solving.
Improve equipment standards, PM quality, changeover support, maintenance response processes, and escalation routines.
Assist with equipment installations, commissioning, startup support, and turnover documentation.
Help build maintenance systems that can scale as the plant grows.