Business Development Manager - New Channels in Reading

Location:

Reading, with hybrid working and regular UK customer travel

You’ve built experience, now use it where bold ideas meet real impact. At Opella, we’re challenging how self-care works for millions of people and need leaders and experts ready to shape what’s next. As a Business Development Manager – New Channels, you’ll bring your skill, your curiosity and your drive to make health simpler, smarter and more human. About the job: You will identify, open and scale profitable new channels and customer partnerships for Opella UK. You’ll shape a prioritised channel strategy, build a high-quality opportunity pipeline and lead prospects from initial contact through negotiation, launch, scale and handover. Working across established and emerging routes to market, you’ll turn consumer, shopper and commercial insight into sustainable growth while protecting our brands and long-term customer relationships. Lead initiatives that advance our brands and strengthen our reputation worldwide. Mentor and uplift emerging talent while pushing your own growth and influence. Put purpose into practice — embedding sustainability, access and social impact into every decision. Model the challenger mindset: question complexity, act with integrity and make things radically simple. Help shape a culture that’s ambitious, collaborative and serious about recognition and belonging. Main responsibilities: Translate Opella UK’s growth ambition into a prioritised channel and prospect plan, identifying where our brands and capabilities can create sustainable value. Build and manage a disciplined pipeline from lead generation and qualification through proposal, negotiation, launch and scale. Develop senior relationships with priority partners across convenience, wholesale, symbol groups, discounters, value retail and other emerging channels. Create compelling, customer-specific propositions that demonstrate shopper relevance, incremental category value and commercial return. Own pricing, commercial terms, trade investment and deal economics, using robust business cases and financial scenarios to support decisions. Lead opportunities from concept to successful launch, coordinating regulatory, supply, systems, distribution and activation readiness across internal teams. Review performance, scale successful initiatives and hand mature business to the appropriate account owner with a clear growth plan. About you: You have demonstrated success identifying, winning and developing profitable new business within UK FMCG, consumer health, wholesale, retail or a relevant adjacent sector. You can build a qualified opportunity pipeline and convert complex, multi-stakeholder prospects into sustainable commercial launches. You have strong commercial and financial judgement, including ownership of revenue, margin, trade investment and customer profitability. You are skilled in prospecting, senior relationship building, influencing and negotiation. You can create market maps, business cases and P&L scenarios, making pragmatic decisions when information is incomplete or limited. You combine an entrepreneurial approach with resilience, accountability and the operational discipline needed to lead opportunities through launch and scale. You can mobilise cross-functional teams and communicate clear recommendations, decisions and trade-offs to senior stakeholders. This is more than the next step in your career, it’s a chance to lead change and help reinvent self-care for the world. If you’re ready to challenge, inspire and deliver impact that matters, we’re ready for you. We are challengers. We are Opella. Opella values diversity in all its forms and is committed to fostering a workplace where everyone can belong and excel. We welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds. About Us: Opella is the self-care challenger with the purest and third-largest portfolio in the Over The Counter (OTC) & Vitamins, Minerals & Supplements (VMS) market globally. Our mission is to bring health in people’s hands by making self-care as simple as it should be. For half a billion consumers worldwide – and counting. At the core of this mission is our 100 loved brands, our 11,000-strong global team, our 13 best-in-class manufacturing sites and 4 specialized science and innovation development centers. Headquartered in France, Opella is the proud maker of many of the world’s most loved brands, including Allegra, Buscopan, Doliprane, Dulcolax, Enterogermina, Essentiale and Mucosolvan. As a globally certified B Corp company, we are active players in the journey towards healthier people and planet. Find out more about our mission at