Further Details:

£350 per day, 12-18 month contract, with a view to permanent in the future

** We’re looking for someone with extensive retail experience within the catering area, ideally with a healthcare background.
At the moment we are looking to expand our business from Patient Food Service to a retail area, initially looking at Staff and Visitor restaurants and a look to expand to further areas.


Business Development Manager - Retail Sales
Business Unit: Healthcare
Reporting to: Divisional Manager - Healthcare
Location: Home Based
Position Type: Fixed Term Contract/Interim 12-18 months

The BDM - Retail Sales will be charged with the introduction and development of a new system created for providing high quality restaurant style food in the retail catering environment.
Initially, we believe the opportunity for this concept lies with hospital staff and visitor facilities. We already have extensive business and relationships with hospital catering management teams but crucially our focus and skills have, to date, focused on the patient feeding area where food is not paid for by the consumer. For staff and visitor feeding, where food is paid for by the consumer, we believe a fundamentally different approach is required.

Job Specification

Separately, our Business Development Team is evaluating other market sectors where we believe the concept provides us with an opportunity. In due course we would expect the BDM to be involved but wish to initially focus his/her energy on the S&V opportunity.
As such the BDM will work closely alongside the current Healthcare sales team who will provide key introductions into the hospitals where we are currently trading and also into hospitals where we believe an opportunity exists. Put quite simply we want the successful candidate to champion the new system, mould, shape and develop it to take account of market requirements - and thereby drive it¡¦s development in this key market. We anticipate this new food concept has the opportunity to be sold both directly to NHS Hospital Caterers but also to contractors providing catering services in the healthcare market.
The individual must have clear operational experience of running a successful retail catering operation, most likely to include time spent within a contract catering environment. They must also have the ability to engage with customers, listen and understand their issues and present how the new concept can address these.
Experience in hospital staff and visitor feeding would be desirable but not essential. He/she must be able to demonstrate from their appropriate experience the ability to :
- Evaluate and set retail pricing
- The development of menus that are consistent with out of home eating trends
- Implement successful promotional activity that achieves clear objectives set
- Create innovative Branding / Merchandising and marketing activities that stimulate sales within a retail catering environment
- Hit sales/profit targets
We would expect a passion for food and the entrepreneurial energy and enthusiasm to develop food concepts. Being able to engage with other members of both the Healthcare team as well as other stakeholders within apetito (i.e. NPD, Marketing and Business Development) will be absolutely crucial to success. He/she must be a proven team player.

Key Responsibilities:
Understand and communicate the optimum approach to retail pricing within the retail catering (Inc. VAT)
Recommend clear pricing strategies
Identify emerging food trends and the compilation of appropriate menu selections for both staff and visitors. On a regular basis review the product proposition and suggest and implement changes accordingly
Incorporate current government policy regarding healthy eating for public sector staff
Recommend how we best offer/merchandise/present menu selections to facilitate optimum sales to include (but not exclusively):
a) Presentation of food on the counter.
b) potential promotion around the hospital
Advise on promotional mechanics (dish of the day, value offer etc.) that work in a retail setting
Advise on appropriate package of marketing/promotional materials to ensure optimum uptake
Ensure the client is fully bought into the approach/as advocated
Ensure operational staff are fully committed to and trained to offer a new approach
Be passionate and be an advocate of the proposition


Qualifications and Experience:
Essential:
Extensive experience of retail catering management
Training Experience
Good communication skills
Customer engagement skills
Great organisational and project management skills.
High standard of business communication skills and numerical analysis.
Intermediate Food Hygiene Qualification


Desirable:
Cook Chill/ Cook Freeze experience
Care/Hospital catering experience to include staff and visitor

Personal Qualities:
Self-motivated, resilient and a good team player. Entrepeneurial spirit. In addition, they must display the interpersonal and organisational skills necessary to implement the new offer
Passionate
Enthused by building strong long term business
Self-motivated and resilient
Pragmatic operator
A strong communicator, internally and externally: Articulate, both verbally and in writing
Good team player: able to work with colleagues to achieve optimum results in both their own role and for the business as a whole.
Personable; Perceived as a low pressure operator with integrity .Well developed influencing skills
Diplomatic, but assertive. Demonstrates gravitas.
Strong work ethic
Good critical thinking skills, including numeric