Opportunity: Senior Development Chef (Marks & Spencer)
Location: Northampton
Why Greencore?
We're a leading manufacturer of convenience food in the UK and our purpose is to make every day taste better.
We're a vibrant, fast-paced leading food manufacturer. Employing around 13,600 colleagues across 16 manufacturing units and 17 distribution depots across the UK. We supply all the UK's food retailers with everything from Sandwiches, soups and sushi to cooking sauces, pickles and ready meals, and in FY23, we generated revenues of £1.9bn.
Our vast direct-to-store (DTS) distribution network, comprising of 17 depots nationwide, enables us to make over 10,400 daily deliveries of our own chilled and frozen produce and that of third parties.
Here at Northampton, we operate one of the most impressive facilities in Europe, based across a campus of 5 manufacturing units, and we have a team of around 2,000 colleagues making high quality premium products every day. We are the sole supplier of sandwiches, wraps, rolls and sushi for Marks & Spencer.
We are seeking a Senior Development Chef with experience in food manufacturing to lead customer focused product development, ensuring high-quality, innovative, and commercially viable food solutions.
Key Responsibilities:
* Develop new and existing recipes that meet customer briefs, nutritional, shelf-life, and cost targets.
* Work collaboratively with product development teams to create recipes aligned with brand standards and manufacturing capabilities.
* Oversee ingredient and packaging specifications to optimize product protection and presentation.
* Lead product presentations, ensuring seamless transition from kitchen to factory production.
* Maintain accurate records of recipes, methods, and product specifications for consistency and scalability.
* Organize and lead internal and external product panels for benchmarking and submissions.
* Manage kitchen workflows, collaborating with the Head Chef and development team to meet critical timelines.
* Support production trials, ensuring factory outputs align with signed-off kitchen quality.
* Contribute to long-term innovation strategies and sustainability initiatives.
* Build strong relationships with customers, driving market-leading product development.
* Ensure a safe and professional development kitchen environment.
* Mentor and develop team members, fostering a culture of continuous improvement.
What We're Looking For:
* Proven culinary expertise with a focus on food trends and innovation.
* Strong background in food manufacturing and product development.
* Ability to translate concepts into commercially viable products.
* Experience in team development and customer collaboration.
* Excellent communication and presentation skills.
This is an exciting opportunity for a creative and strategic chef to make a significant impact in a dynamic food manufacturing environment.
What You'll Get in Return:
* Competitive salary and job-related benefits.
* Generous holiday allowance.
* Pension scheme (up to 8% matched contribution).
* Company share save scheme.
* Access to exclusive Greencore employee discounts.
* Greencore Qualifications and ongoing development opportunities.
* Full access to our Wellbeing Centre platform.