Find the Right Role for Your Future

Our Client

A rapidly growing grocery retailer serving Hispanic communities with a strong focus on fresh, authentic products. Known for operational excellence and cultural relevance, the company is committed to providing a standout in-store experience built on quality, freshness, and community connection.

Why You’ll Want to Work Here

• Strategic Leadership Opportunity: Own and drive the entire fresh department strategy across produce, meat, seafood, deli, bakery, and prepared foods.
• Cultural Impact: Shape offerings to reflect and serve the preferences of Hispanic shoppers in key regions like Miami and beyond.
• High Visibility: Report directly to the CMO, oversee a team of Directors, and influence company-wide growth, innovation, and profitability.
• Strong Compensation: Competitive salary, bonus, PTO, and executive benefits.
• People-Centered: Lead and mentor a large, passionate team with clear goals, structured development, and tangible performance metrics.

Role Overview

The Vice President of Fresh will lead the strategic vision, financial performance, and operational excellence of all fresh food departments—including produce, meat, seafood, deli, bakery, and prepared foods – across the store network. This role demands a visionary operator who understands the nuances of both merchandising innovation and financial discipline, particularly within Hispanic and multicultural markets.

You will sit above the Directors of Produce, Meat & Seafood, and Café/Bakery, guiding them on everything from departmental design to speed-to-shelf execution. This includes driving product development, fostering a high-accountability culture, and ensuring each concept—from idea to execution—is profitable. You’ll also play a critical role in shaping the company’s go-to-market approach through Store 36, the hub for testing and validating fresh concepts.

Core Responsibilities

Strategic Leadership & Innovation

• Design and implement tailored fresh category strategies that balance creativity with financial accountability.
• Own “wildly important goals” in sales and profitability; guide leaders to align departmental efforts to company scoreboards and KPIs.
• Act as a cultural ambassador, ensuring product offerings resonate with Hispanic consumers and reflect regional preferences.

Operational & Merchandising Excellence

• Lead day-to-day operations across all fresh departments, ensuring quality, freshness, and merchandising standards are consistently upheld.
• Define department layout, in-store presentation, and innovation pipelines in partnership with store ops and marketing.
• Partner with store 36 to pilot, train, and launch new products and processes.

Vendor & Product Development Oversight

• Build strong partnerships with culturally relevant suppliers and food producers, especially those specializing in Latin American products.
• Lead contract negotiations, sourcing decisions, and end-to-end product costing (ingredients, labor, packaging).
• Champion the full lifecycle of product innovation—from concept to shelf—ensuring margin and customer experience align.

Team Leadership & Accountability

• Lead and mentor 3 established Directors, instilling high performance, accountability, and mentorship practices throughout the fresh team.
• Establish clear KPIs and run regular meetings with direct reports to track sales, profitability, merchandising, and innovation progress.
• Create a culture of collaboration, goal setting, and motivation while developing succession plans and bench strength.

Financial & Compliance Leadership

• Own the P&L for all fresh departments, including top-line sales, gross and net profit, shrink, and overhead.
• Ensure department heads understand and manage financial metrics, product-level economics, and the intersection of innovation and margin.
• Oversee food safety, sustainability efforts, and regulatory compliance across all locations.

Ideal Profile

• Experience: 10–15+ years in fresh food leadership, ideally in multicultural grocery, natural foods, or high-volume perishable environments. Experience managing restaurant or wholesale P&Ls is highly valuable.
• Leadership: Proven success managing multi-store operations with direct oversight of Director-level teams and a focus on driving performance through mentorship, KPIs, and culture-building.
• Fresh Expertise: Deep understanding of perishables merchandising, product development, speed-to-shelf processes, and operational execution.
• Financial Acumen: Strong grasp of budgeting, pricing, shrink, gross/net profit, labor costing, and vendor negotiations. Able to link creativity with financial return.
• Cultural Fluency: Bilingual (Spanish/English) and a strong understanding of Hispanic food culture and regional nuances, especially in markets like Miami.
• Education: Bachelor’s in Business, Food Science, or a related field required; MBA or advanced training in food retail operations a plus.