It’s not often that one has the opportunity to join one of the top sales forces, within one of the decade’s largest and still fastest growing categories in all of produce. Here is one of those rare occasions! This is your opportunity to jump into the fast paced and exciting avocado business with an outstanding company where your hard work will be rewarded through competitive compensation, excellent benefits, and professional development. This opportunity “checks all the boxes.”
Our client is one of North America’s leading Avocado shippers. They are pioneers in this explosive category and attribute their incredible success to consistently delivering the best value and service to their customers. To accomplish this, they invest in their team members and overall growth of the company. Their long-standing grower relationships, coupled with best in class supply chain logistics and strategically located ripening distribution centers, allows them to service the top customers across North America.
Growth and success creates opportunities, and that is the case here. Our client is going to add an exceptional new sales professional to their team.
Their retail sales team is made up of sales leaders in the fresh produce industry with a strong desire to maximize sales and profit with their top tier customer base. They are extremely passionate about the fresh produce industry and have a deep understanding of the U.S. retail sector. They are masters of relationship development and strengthening at multiple levels within top tier retailer organizations. They are team players who collaborate with their sales management executives and peers on sales tactics and strategies in alignment with their departmental and company objectives. They become experts in all aspects of the avocado category, and this expertise, combined with their sales acumen, drives them to unparalleled sales volume growth and profitability.
PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITIES:
- Growth of assigned U.S. retail customer base
- Responsible for the sales, service, retention, and growth of assigned retail customers
- Manages customer price and volume quotes within the outlined parameters, including daily market quotes, short term advance quotes, Ad and Lid quotes, and contract program quotes. Must hold customers accountable for price, volume, and date range commitments.
- Performs customer demand forecasting by completing a rolling 5-week advance forecast for all customers with a weekly purchase frequency. Reviews forecast accuracy report weekly to improve performance and meets/exceeds expectations of management.
- Manages assigned customers credit limits and accounts payables and assists the credit and collections specialist and VP sales and business development with assigned customers credit limits, account payables, and short pays.
- Participates in monitoring aging product inventory and proactively engages with the planning and sales teams in selling aging and distressed products from all distribution center locations.
- Runs and reviews customer sales and price performance reports using the Microsoft PowerBI sales reporting database. Demonstrates the use of data to assist in making informed decisions and driving the business to meet company, sales team, and salesperson objectives.
- Creates effective methods of customer sales and relationship growth in the COVID-19 era of limited travel, limited in-person meetings, and greatly reduced frequency of industry trade shows and events.
SECONDARY RESPONSIBILITIES:
- Organized and effective prospecting that leads to successful development, onboarding, and growth of new retailers in the U.S. and Canada.
- Identifies and qualifies prospective new retail customers in accordance with sales management parameters including purchase volume and frequency, pricing format & frequency, product mix, country of origin preferences, geographic location/s, value added services, financial/payment performance, and accessibility/communication ease.
- Creates effective methods of new customer development, retention, and growth in the COVID-19 era of limited travel, limited in-person meetings, and greatly reduced frequency of industry trade shows and events.
OTHER RESPONSIBILITIES:
- Business travel for customer meetings, industry trade shows, and events.
- Prepares and executes quarterly and annual business reviews for the Sales Management Team.
- Consistently works towards the successful completion of annual bonus goal and development goal objectives.
- Active participation and contributions during daily sales team meetings.
- Collaboration with marketing team and sales analyst for customer presentations, business reviews, and joint-marketing promotions.
- Collaboration with industry marketing associations.
REQUIREMENTS:
- Minimum Bachelor’s degree in business, marketing, economics, or related field.
- Minimum of 10 years of fresh produce sales with a current customer base of high profile national and regional U.S. retailers.
- A proven track record of growth with current customer base and successful new customer development and retention.
- A deep understanding of the U.S. retail fresh produce sector.
- A strong passion for the fresh produce industry, produce sales, market share growth, and company profitability.
- A strong desire to win and beat the competition.
- A commitment to providing excellent customer service.
- Excellent written, verbal and interpersonal skills with the ability to engage customers on a consistent basis.
- A strong sense of responsibility to act with integrity, lead by example, and promote the company in a positive and professional manner.
- Competency in Microsoft applications including Word, Excel, and Outlook. Experience with programs such as Microsoft PowerBI, iTrade. Famous ERP, and Oracle Sales Cloud CRM is a plus.
- Competency with LinkedIn and Instagram for customer networking, relationship management and promotion of company to targeted audience.
- Bilingual Spanish and English preferred but not required.
This Job has a $1,000 Referral Reward!
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If you would like to discuss this job opportunity in 100% confidentiality with a Joe Produce Search Consultant, please call Recruiting at 855-563-7763, or email recruiting@joeproduce.com |
