Category Insights Manager in Welwyn Garden City

Location: Welwyn Garden City – Hybrid working

Salary: £43,000 to £48,000 dependent upon experience

Business Area: Nestlé Cereal Partners

Some of our other fantastic benefits: Potential, discretionary bonus; Generous pension scheme; 12 flexible days on top of 25-day holiday entitlement; 2 paid volunteering days; A focus on personal development and growth.

Note: This is a full-time permanent opportunity. Flexibility is welcome and can be discussed during the application process.

Your impact

Your key responsibilities will include:

• Develop long term sustainable category partnerships with key retailers in our Developing Channels area of the business which includes Discounters, Convenience & Wholesale. The priority will be Aldi, Lidl & Coop but may go wider in these channels depending on the request.
• Design and execute an annual insight plan, demonstrating category thought leadership, expertise in knowing and understanding the shopper, and highlighting short-term & long-term growth opportunities.
• Set up and maintain regular meetings with the buyer to progress the category plan.
• Proactively manage customer range reviews, merchandising changes, store trials and ad-hoc projects providing fact-based recommendations and solutions, ensuring all key customer deadlines are met.
• Champion our Category and Shopper Vision as a framework for long-term growth, tailoring where possible to increase customer relevance & understanding. Work alongside the Shopper team to then provide actionable recommendations for activation or trial.
• Produce advanced data analysis from multiple data sources to provide relevant reports, category updates and trend updates.
• Participate in shopper research projects as and when required.
• Be a data expert – interrogating all available data resources which may include KANTAR / CIRCANA / IGD / DUNNHUMBY / NECTAR / MINTEL to generate insight and champion data usage across the business.
• Contribute to the annual category planning process, and work with the Category Development Manager to drive strategic direction for your retailers and ensuring the category growth agenda is always top of mind.
• Be the shopper expert providing insight and the shoppers point of view to Sales, Marketing & the Shopper Activation team.
• Actively provide consultant advice and support to the Sales & Marketing teams to highlight distribution, range and promotional strategy opportunities for Cereal Partners in your customers / channels.

Requirements

Your ingredients for success:

• You’ll have a breadth of category insights experience within FMCG and have a proven track record in being a data expert. Ideally, you’ll have worked across different retailer multiple accounts and/or different channels.
• Experience of interrogating data sources such as Kantar, Circana, Dunnhumby or Nectar to generate insight and champion data usage across the business is essential.
• Have excellent attention to detail.
• Be highly numerate and analytical with prior working knowledge of category sales data.
• Extracting insight from data sources is key; be able to craft and relay the story with clear insights, opportunities and actions.
• Work on own initiative and as part of a wide cross-functional team.
• Aptitude for IT skills, strong in Excel and PowerPoint; experience in space planning systems is advantageous.
• Be comfortable in front of customers and influence them by presenting with expertise on the category.

What You Need To Know

Advert posting date: 30/04/2026

Advert closing date: 14/05/2026

We will consider candidates as they apply and may close the advertisement early if we receive sufficient applicants. Please submit your application promptly.

At Nestlé, our values are rooted in respect and inclusion. We encourage applications from individuals of all gender identities, ethnic backgrounds, those with disabilities, parents, carers and members of the LGBT+ community. Please let us know if we can provide accommodations to ensure full participation in the application process. We are committed to diversity and inclusion and have been recognised for gender equality and inclusion initiatives.