Position Summary:

Product Specialist – Protein (Centre of the Plate) is responsible for:

• providing sales support, product knowledge, guidance and training to the sales group while constantly improving their understanding of the centre of the plate (protein) category.

• identify customer needs and provide options that meet their requirements to create additional sales.

• Collaborate with sales partners to provide business consulting services aimed at strengthening customer relationships and growing profitable sales
   

This position is located in Calgary, Alberta.

Minimum Education and Experience:

• Culinary, Sales, Marketing, Business – Preferred

• Certification or License – Must maintain a valid, unrestricted provincial driver’s license and safe driving record per GFS policy. – Required

• Certification or License – Culinary certification (such as Red Seal) – Preferred

• Two years previous product, marketing, or internal sales experience -or- six years previous product, marketing, or internal sales experience in lieu of a bachelor degree.

Essential Functions:

• The Product Specialist – COP works with the sales team driving sales with existing customers and identifying new opportunities.

• Provide relevant business solutions to complement the initiatives of our Sales and Marketing teams, with an ultimate goal of increasing the overall market share of Gordon Food Service.

• Must be aware and stay current with the commodity market and market trends such as learning and having great understanding of GFS products and competitors’ products, brands and offerings.

• Consults with key customers to provide menu analysis and development with assistance from the divisional Culinary Team.

• Provide problem analysis and resolution to customers and Sales team members on product related concerns.

• Supports customer menu engineering by developing and testing recipes for customers as requested by Divisional Leadership and customizes existing Gordon Food Service deck recipes to specific customer needs.

• Researches local trends and provides guidance to support customer relationship management.

• Provides insights to divisional Marketing and Sales teams, and ensures the success of customer events and activities result in business metric improvement for both customer and company.

• Ensures consistent and relevant product and culinary training for sales teams, in collaboration with other divisional marketing team members.

• Provides local culinary support, insights, division and customer relationship management training, and engagement (extension of Category and Product Brands) to help support business growth (for both customers and company).

• Leverages company provided marketing materials, insights to be used in the Division and direct to customers, support adoption and leverage of tools.

• Participates in the execution of food shows, other related shows and activities in support of strategic divisional events.

• Performs other duties as assigned.
   

Knowledge / Skills / Abilities:

• Strong culinary knowledge and skill; safe food handling practices

• Strong product category experience and knowledge

• Ability to develop creative food solutions

• Exceptional customer service skills

• Proficient communication skills ‐ both written and verbal ‐ to communicate effectively with a broad‐based team including diverse internal stakeholders and vendors.

• Proficient skill in presentation creation and delivery

• Time management and organizational skills to manage multiple projects

• Strong business acumen and understanding of restaurant operations

• Proven ability to deliver results and facilitate a collaborative environment

• Must be able to travel at 20% of the time