- Flax Bourton, Bristol, North Somerset, BS48 1UL View on Map
JOB TITLE Lead Development Chef
REPORTS TO CEO
DIRECT REPORTS 2x Development Chefs
LOCATION FSC Bristol Innovation Centre (BIC), Farleigh Church, Farleigh Court, Old Weston Road, Flax Bourton, Bristol, North Somerset BS48 1UL, GB
BENEFITS Competitive salary + 20 days holiday + your birthday off + healthcare scheme + other company benefits
HOURS Permanent, full time, Monday to Friday; 9am to 5pm (flexibility required around client presentations, factory trials and travel)
Company background
FSC is a family business with more than 35 years of award-winning experience in creating, rolling out and managing bespoke customer food-on-the-move solutions. Our customers include a selection of blue-chip companies in various industries, such as Shell, National Trust, Waterstones and Dunelm.
We offer a range of consultancy services drawing on our in-depth knowledge of the food-on-the-move sector and have managed projects all over the world.
Our Head Office is located in the world-famous village of Cheddar, our Innovation Centre is based near Bristol in Flax Bourton. Internationally, we also have offices in Prague (Czech Republic) and Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia)
Although our colleagues are based all over the world, we regularly get together to review performance, share best practice and socialise! As well as working in a challenging and fast-moving environment, we believe it is important to have a big chunk of fun and no day is ever the same at FSC.
At FSC we believe in ethical stewardship of all aspects within our business. This means that we thrive in a diverse, equitable culture where we celebrate inclusion and empowerment within our teams, and seek to always support our global community, minimising our carbon footprint wherever possible.
To help grow this awareness we have adopted a companywide ESG focus.
Purpose of role:
To lead the development of exciting, commercially viable food-on-the-move ranges across FSC’s customer base, from first idea through to launch. The Lead Development Chef owns the creative and technical direction of NPD. They hold the day-to-day development relationship with key customers, turn a brief into a range that hits the target cost and the operational reality of the outlet, and sign it off as ready for manufacture. They also lead and develop the development chef team (two Development Chefs), setting the standards the NPD kitchen works to.
The role will involve:
Concept & Product Development: Own and support the concept-to-launch process across multiple customer accounts, running several projects in parallel. Turn customer briefs into coherent ranges with a clear point of difference, set creative direction balancing trend, customer expectation and commercial reality, lead ideation sessions, keep up to date with UK and international food trends and competitor ranges, and approve final recipes and specifications that are accurate, achievable and manufacturable at scale.
Customer & Account Ownership: Present ranges and concepts confidently to customers at all levels, manage expectations on timing, cost and feasibility, push back constructively where a brief is not deliverable, and support international customers by adapting ranges to local supply chain and consumer expectations.
Commercial: Take responsibility for hitting agreed cost and margin targets, reformulate products to close cost gaps without losing quality, manage key cost drivers across ingredients, labour, packaging and yield, and control kitchen and sample spend.
Leading the Team: Lead, manage and develop the development chef team, allocate projects and workload, coach and train, carry out one-to-ones, appraisals and objective setting, support recruitment and induction, and set the standard for food, behaviour and the way the kitchen is run.
Suppliers & Sourcing: Build and manage relationships with national and international suppliers, source new and emerging ingredients, lead sample requests and supplier trials, and work with manufacturing partners on factory trials, scale-up and first production runs.
Kitchen, Standards & Compliance: Hold overall accountability for the NPD kitchen (standards, cleanliness, equipment and stock control), ensure food safety and hygiene procedures and records are maintained, meet allergen, labelling, shelf-life and HACCP requirements, and lead shelf-life testing, heating trials and operational validation in outlet conditions.
Working Across the Business: Work closely with technical, procurement, operations, marketing and sales, understand operational capabilities within customer outlets to drive simplicity and consistency, promote a positive can-do attitude, and attend corporate events, trade shows and functions as required.
Qualifications:
Education from a food-related college, e.g. NVQ Level 2 in Professional Cookery
Level 3 Food Safety & Food Hygiene
A valid, full and clean UK driving licence
Right to work in the UK
Preferred
Level 4 Food Safety, HACCP or equivalent
Experience:
5 years’ experience in NPD, food manufacturing or high-volume commercial kitchens
Proven track record of taking products from concept through to launch
Experience managing, mentoring or leading chefs
Strong understanding of the food manufacturing environment and scale-up
Experience presenting to and managing customer or client relationships
Experience across retail, food-to-go or foodservice channels preferred
Experience working with international customers or markets preferred
Chef-led or fine dining background alongside commercial NPD preferred
Skills and Qualifications:
Commercial Acumen: Highly numerate, with strong recipe costing and specification skills and confidence working to cost and margin targets.
Leadership: A strong, credible leader able to set direction for the team and promote a culture of empowerment, trust and continuous improvement.
Organisation: Excellent organisational skills, able to hold multiple projects and customer accounts at different stages simultaneously.
Communication Skills: Excellent written and verbal communication skills, calm and credible in front of customers, including under challenge.
Creativity: Creative and innovative, with strong food presentation skills, a passion for food and ingredient quality, and a keen eye for emerging trends.
Digital Adoption: Confident using recipe costing, specification and AI-supported tools to inform recommendations.
Travel: Willingness to travel to suppliers, customers, manufacturing sites or between offices, including overseas.
#J-18808-Ljbffr
