Demand & Production Planner (S&OP / Material Planning)

About us
Symrise is a global supplier of fragrances and flavors, cosmetic active ingredients as well as functional ingredients. Its customers include perfume, cosmetics, food and beverage manufacturers, the pharmaceutical industry and producers of dietary supplements and pet food.


With sales of around €4.9 billion in the 2025 financial year, the company is one of the world's leading providers. The Group, headquartered in Holzminden, Germany, has more than 100 locations in Europe, Africa and the Middle East, Asia, the USA and Latin America.

Together with its customers, Symrise develops new ideas and market-ready concepts for products that form an indispensable part of everyday life. Economic success and corporate responsibility are inextricably linked.


Symrise - always inspiring more...

Your role
Position Summary


This role supports North America Sales & Operations (S&OP) demand planning process for Food & Beverages. Will lead the demand forecast for assigned items/customers in alignment with Sales supporting our one Go-To-Market approach. Based on historical data, trends, functional inputs and new product introductions, this role will provide visibility on our future demand and lead consensus where required to improve forecast accuracy, reduce inventory risk and increase speed to market. There will be a focus on Supply Planning and determining how to meet forecasted demand by balancing customer service goals against inventory, manufacturing capacity, and material constraints. It will be a pivotal role in integrating and collaborating as One Team across North America F&B, maximizing efficiencies across legal entities.


Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Support monthly S&OP process for NA Food and Beverage and serves as key contact and connection point between commercial and operations team
• Own and maintain the forecast in our planning systems (ForecastPro, Colibiri)
• Generate insights out of forecast, running actuals to forward forecasting analytics to understand the data, trend, seasonality, cycle etc. to improve the existing forecasting. Sense-check statistical forecasts and highlight any unexpected trends or projections. Challenge customer forecast where insights may show gaps
• Partner and communicate closely with Sales and Customer Service teams to understand customer behaviors and other key information that can influence forecast changes.
• Work closely with customer service teams to analyze incoming customer orders and use demand sensing techniques to adjust short-term forecasts
• Review and analyze forecast changes, conduct trend analysis, identifying risks / opportunities, and provide detailed analysis of changes, mitigation proposals.
• Ensures Monthly Consensus forecast from individual account S&OP process is maintained in proper ERP system to relay accurate demand signals to production planning
• Own supply planning deliverables to convert the consensus forecast into an executable supply plan (e.g., production plan/MPS inputs, inventory targets & safety stock, and SKU/location constraint alignment).
• Integrate Giraffe Foods into the NA F&B S&OP cadence, including Demand Review, Supply Review, capacity planning and CAPEX planning/spend visibility.
• Use of advanced tools/techniques to do data cleaning, researching and collection of new data/demand drivers both internal and external, feature engineering, feature selection, selecting best models/algorithm using the right evaluation criteria to generate the most accurate forecast.
• Close collaboration with Customer Service, Production Planning, QC, Production and Logistics to drive efficient inventory level and on time delivery.
• Partner with Inventory Manager to identify risks of SLOBs and mitigate excess/obsolete inventory
• Closely monitor new pipeline opportunities and align with BU and Sales teams on when opportunities must be converted into actionable forecast. Align on new item/business forecast and provide to production team to achieve customer lead time
• Collaborate with cross-functional team to drive the overall management and execution Supply Chain projects like Inventory Task Force, Safety stock, forecast improvement, and reporting.
• Prepares Forecast Accuracy Report and KPI's, identifying root cause of inaccuracies and coordinate actions for improvement
• Support the Supply Chain and Operations teams in any relevant reporting needs

About you
Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's Degree in Business Administration, Engineering, Supply Chain, or similar fields. Flavor and/or FMCG or related industry is an added advantage.
• 5+ years of experience within Demand Planning or Supply Chain Planning.
• 3+ years of experience with S&OP
• High level of proficiency in Microsoft Office.
• Demonstrated proficiency in statistics, forecasting and forecasting methods with an understanding of their financial and operational impacts.
• Self-motivated, strongly disciplined and ability to collaborate with internal stakeholders and cross-functional teams.
• Strong analytical skills, sound judgement and drive for excellence.
• Strong understanding of SAP and/or software related to demand planning is an added advantage.
• Experience with BI tools (MicroStrategy, Tableau) are preferred.
• Experience developing and managing SQL databases a plus (Alteryx, Access)
• In office 3 days a week

Our offer
Become part of our open and transparent culture. It will give you the opportunity to flourish and to develop inspiring experiences that contribute to the health and well-being of consumers in 160 countries around the world. Putting our employees in focus fuels our strong company growth above market rates and makes us an excellent place to develop your career.


Come join us and embark on a fascinating journey with Symrise.


If you feel that you fit the above criteria, then please apply by using our online application system. Your application will be treated confidentially.


We are an Equal Opportunity Employer. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, sex, national origin or any other basis protected by applicable law. All employment decisions are made on the basis of qualifications, merit and business necessity.


Pay Transparency Disclosure: The expected annual salary range for this position is USD 84288.00 - USD 99000.00. Actual pay will be determined based on experience, qualifications, geographic location, and other job-related factors permitted by law. A discretionary annual bonus may be available based on individual and company performance.