Production Manager

Description:

About the Company

Nestled in the Green Mountains of northern Vermont is a company quietly shaping the landscape of agriculture and food distribution: Butternut Mountain Farm. As one of the largest maple syrup companies in the world, Butternut Mountain Farm works closely with maple sugarmakers to aggregate production in order to supply markets too large for any single producer. Customers include leading national retailers across all channels and food manufacturers from emerging brands to Fortune 500 CPGs. Extraordinary customer service, quality products, and a genuine commitment to the industry underpin Butternut Mountain Farm's 50 years of connecting maple from tree to table.

Job Purpose

The Production Manager leads production across multiple departments, lines, and two shifts, aligning schedules, labor, materials, equipment capacity, and inventory with customer demand and business needs. The role develops frontline leaders, ensures safe and compliant operations, controls production costs, drives continuous improvement, and partners across functions to deliver reliable customer service.

Major Tasks

Production planning and execution: Lead production across departments, lines, and shifts; adjust schedules and resources to customer demand, inventory, staffing, materials, equipment capacity, and constraints; coordinate all production areas; and protect schedule attainment, service, and cost performance.

Safety, quality, and compliance: Maintain strong safety, food safety, quality, sanitation, and traceability culture; enforce policies, procedures, and work instructions; ensure accurate records; lead corrective actions; and support SQF, regulatory, customer, environmental, workplace, and internal audit requirements.

Performance and continuous improvement: Establish and communicate KPIs for productivity, throughput, labor, overtime, downtime, waste, quality, staffing, and schedule attainment; use data and root-cause analysis to improve reliability, efficiency, workflows, equipment utilization, material handling, and cost.

Materials and inventory: Optimize syrup, ingredients, packaging, labor, and other resources; reduce loss, waste, rework, and abnormal usage; maintain inventory accuracy and traceability; and resolve significant discrepancies or shortages.

Equipment and capital support: Coordinate repairs, preventive maintenance, and planned downtime with Maintenance; address recurring reliability issues; and support equipment trials, installations, startups, replacements, and capital projects.

People leadership: Lead and develop supervisors, leads, and employees; set performance expectations; conduct coaching, reviews, training, and development planning; strengthen frontline decision-making; and participate in hiring, onboarding, employee relations, corrective action, and personnel decisions.

Labor, budget, and capacity management: Manage staffing, overtime, absenteeism, labor utilization, and operating expenses; participate in the Production budget; and support annual operating, capital, and long-range capacity plans.

Cross-functional leadership: Communicate priorities, risks, constraints, and performance to the Operations Management Team; resolve issues across functions; and provide production input for new products, packaging, process changes, equipment projects, and capacity decisions.

Qualifications

Bachelors degree in management, Business, Economics, Engineering or related field

Leadership experience across multiple departments, production lines, or shifts in food, beverage, bottling, packaging, or another regulated manufacturing environment.

Working knowledge of SQF, HACCP, GMPs, sanitation, food safety, traceability, and production documentation.

Experience using production KPIs, ERP/MRP systems, scheduling, inventory control, forecasting, and capacity planning.

Knowledge of Lean, 5S, root-cause analysis, preventive maintenance, equipment reliability, and continuous improvement.

Experience with budgeting, labor and overtime management, production cost control, hiring, coaching, performance management, and employee development.

Strong Excel and data-analysis skills, mechanical aptitude, and familiarity with automated filling, packaging, conveying, batching, or processing equipment and related capital projects.

Compensation and Benefits

• Competitive salary, and benefit package, including medical, dental, vision, life, disability, holidays, and paid time off
• 401K Retirement Plan with company contribution
• Product discounts and free breakfast for on-site staff

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