The Hershey Company
Discounter Channel Manager
How your CV stacks up
Upload your CV to see how well it fits this job role
?%
Discounter Channel Manager
Role Title: Discounter Channel Lead
Location: London
Summary
Hershey is a fast-growing confectionery company within the UK, aiming to drive growth across all channels ahead of the category. We are looking for a driven and ambitious individual to join our team to help deliver our growth ambitions for the UK market, with a focus on our leading brand Reese’s.
This role is responsible for leading the Discounter Channel (Aldi & Lidl), working with our UK distributor and cross-functionally within Hershey to ensure continued profitable sales growth.
The role focuses on revenue delivery in terms of net sales, gross profit, category/market share, and operating income by developing and executing business plans, collaborating closely with Marketing, Finance, and Supply Chain. This role will work hand in hand with our established distributor team and the respective National Account Managers from distributors.
Key priorities include achieving channel and customer profitability (via management of all promotional spend and sales budgets), market share, and distribution goals. Additional responsibilities include coaching and developing the distributor’s National Account Managers.
We seek an individual who is:
- A brilliant communicator with strategic thinking and a commercial mindset.
- Focused on developing robust growth strategies for the channel and fostering partnerships with key customers.
- Driven, tenacious, and capable of prioritising rigorously due to the scale of opportunity within the UK market.
- Close to market trends and discount channel dynamics, sharing insights to optimize performance.
Reasons to use Rodeo
Start with a chat, not a search bar
Grad scheme, placement, apprenticeship? Not sure what you want yet — that's fine. Your agent talks it through with you and turns "I have no idea" into a shortlist.
It searches the market for you
Every day your agent scans the market matching roles against what actually matters to you, not just keywords on a CV.
Only hits
No noise. No "maybe this fits." Just roles with a clear explanation of why they're right — and where to focus when applying.
Major Duties & Responsibilities
Market Strategies & Execution
- Defines and grows the base business through effective sales and customer marketing strategies at the trade level.
- Executes “where to play” and “how to win” trade, customer, and shopper programs that deliver financial and business outcomes, with clear marketing, sales, and financial deliverables.
- Leads the alignment of customer marketing, field sales, and Supply Chain to drive profitable growth for key accounts in the Discount Channel (via UK distributor).
- Develops and executes geographic, channel, and customer priorities and communicates action plans to internal and external stakeholders.
- Monitors and reports on the execution of strategies with all relevant stakeholders.
- Co-owns joint business plans with distributors, identifying priorities within channels.
Distributor Management
- Oversees sales goals delivery through distributor teams via structured KPIs, reflecting executed strategies across the market.
- Tracks progress on KPIs including:
- Gross invoice sales
- In-country sales
- Promotional spend
- Distributor trade inventory
- Oversees the delivery of sales KPIs as the primary driver of distributor relationships and joint business performance.
Customer Marketing & Finance
- Delivers market strategies in-outlets, collaborating with marketing to optimize poseration, pricing, promotion, and placement.
- Co-leads implementation of a healthy P&L across channels, covering:
- Total business
- Brand and customer P&Ls
- Sales-to-expense and controllable SG&A management.
People Management
- Participates in the development of in-market talent and strategies.
- Internally designs and executes sales incentives, aligning rewards with distributor performance for channels as needed.
Get help with your application
Your very own career expert that helps elevate your application to the next level.
Competencies
- Strategic Agility – Ability to anticipate future trends, develop breakthrough strategies, and adapt competitively.
- Business Acumen – Deep understanding of business operations, competitors, policies, and market dynamics.
- Drive for Results – Keeps self and others focused on achieving breakthrough goals, demonstrating persistence.
- Problem-Solving – Structured approach to resolving challenges, making decisions under pressure.
- Team Leadership – Motivates teams, empowering individuals, accountability, and feedback provision.
- Process Management – Streamlines processes, integrates teams, and drives efficiencies.
- Building Talent Capability – Support workforce planning, succession, career development, and diversity initiatives.
Minimum Knowledge, Skills & Abilities Required
- Deep knowledge of sales and account management.
- Excellent verbal/written communication, interpersonal, and presentation skills.
- Experience operating in cross-functional teams.
- Exposure to distributor management (helpful but not mandatory).
Education & Experience
- Bachelor’s degree required.
- Minimum 5 years of experience in sales, Key Account Management, and FMCG—ideally with UK Discount Channels (Aldi/Lidl).
- Demonstrated ability for functional skills progression or growth in business size/complexity. Error: Appropriate gtk-slot commands =).
“It took my CV and asked me questions relevant to understanding what kind of jobs to suggest for me. Suggestions were almost perfect. Jobs were exactly what I’ve been looking for.”
Jessica, London
Skills
Location