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New Product Development Manager
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NPD MANAGER – DESSERTS
Manchester Area | Food Manufacturing | Permanent
Are you an NPD leader who knows how to turn a great dessert concept into a commercially successful launch?
We’re recruiting an NPD Manager for an established food manufacturer in the Manchester area, leading product development within the desserts category.
This is a hands-on leadership role for someone who can combine creativity with strong commercial and operational thinking, managing the journey from customer brief and kitchen concept through factory trials, scale-up and successful launch.
The Role
- Lead the NPD function across the desserts category
- Manage projects from concept through to launch
- Lead, coach and develop the NPD team
- Work directly with major UK retail customers
- Translate customer briefs and market trends into commercially viable products
- Lead recipe development, benchmarking and product presentations
- Oversee factory trials, scale-up and product handover
- Manage critical paths to ensure projects deliver against customer deadlines
- Partner with Technical, Operations, Commercial, Procurement and Process teams
- Drive innovation while balancing quality, cost, manufacturability and margin
- Identify opportunities for renovation, value engineering and category growth
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What We’re Looking For
You will ideally have:
- NPD/Product Development experience within food category
- Experience managing or developing an NPD team
- Strong concept-to-launch experience
- Customer-facing exposure with UK retailers
- Experience taking products from development kitchen into factory production
- Strong commercial awareness around costing, margin and value engineering
- The confidence to challenge, influence and work cross-functionally
- A practical, creative and delivery-focused leadership style
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Why Consider It?
This is an opportunity to take genuine ownership of NPD within a fast-moving category, influence the innovation pipeline and work closely with both customers and the wider manufacturing operation.
If you understand that successful NPD isn't just about creating a great product it's about creating something the customer wants, the factory can make and the business can make money from I'd like to speak with you.
Apply below or contact me directly for a confidential conversation.
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