At Inovata Foods, we're not your typical food manufacturer. We combine the resources, customer base, and growth opportunities of a large North American food company with the entrepreneurial spirit and agility of a family-owned business. Our team members have the opportunity to make meaningful contributions, influence business decisions, and see their ideas come to life on retail shelves across North America.
As a trusted private label partner to many of North America's leading retailers, Inovata Foods develops and manufactures wholesome frozen meals that consumers serve to their families every week. Our reputation has been built on creating products that rival or exceed national brands while delivering exceptional value.
We are seeking a Director, Product Development & Innovation to lead our product development strategy and innovation efforts. Based in Tillsonburg, Ontario, this role will oversee product development and commercialization activities for both our Tillsonburg and Edmonton facilities. The role will report directly to the CEO initially, and will transition to the VP of Sales once the function is onboarded and operating at a high level.
This is a highly visible leadership position that combines creative thinking, customer engagement, strategic planning, and practical manufacturing judgment. One day you may be leading an innovation presentation with a retail customer, the next coaching a Product Developer through a formulation challenge, and the next walking the plant floor during a trial to confirm the product can be manufactured consistently at scale.
Position Summary
This position is responsible for leading Inovata Foods' product development strategy, innovation pipeline, customer-facing R&D activities, and the Product Development and Commercialization team. This role ensures Inovata is developing the right products: products that delight consumers, fit customer needs, can be manufactured well, meet quality and food safety expectations, and support the company's financial objectives.
The Director serves as the primary product development representative to customers' product teams and works closely with Sales, Operations, Quality Assurance, Procurement, Engineering, Regulatory, and Finance to bring new and revised products from concept through launch. The Director sets priorities, makes trade-off decisions, removes roadblocks, and ensures the Product Developer and Commercialization Manager are working together with clear ownership.
Key Responsibilities with Time Allocation Estimate
Innovation Strategy & Customer Engagement - 15%
- Own the innovation pipeline and ensure it is aligned with customer strategy, consumer trends, plant capability, margin expectations, and company growth priorities.
- Identify emerging trends and convert insights into customer-ready innovation concepts.
- Partner with Sales to lead customer innovation sessions, product presentations, category reviews, plant tours, and customer events.
- Manage customer expectations around timing, cost, product performance, operational fit, and launch readiness.
Leadership & Team Development - 10%
- Lead, coach, and develop the Product Development and Commercialization team.
- Set clear priorities, decision rights, and expectations across the product development and launch process.
- Build an engaged, accountable team that works cross-functionally and lives Inovata's RECIPE values.
- Ensure the Product Developers are focused on the food and manufacturability while the Commercialization Project Manager owns project discipline and launch details.
Product Development - 50%
- Creating recipes (bill of material).
- Directly doing product development for high stakes strategic initiatives.
- Provide direction on product positioning, sensory targets, ingredient choices, and recipe trade-offs.
- Review prototypes, samples, and trial results to confirm products meet the customer brief and Inovata's quality standards.
- Ensure new products balance taste, texture, nutrition, value, cost, food safety, operational efficiency, and manufacturability.
- Support strategic product development work in the kitchen, pilot environment, and plant as needed.
Commercialization & Launch Leadership - 10%
- Partner with the Commercialization Manager to ensure launch timelines, action logs, system data, specifications, labels, approvals, customer documentation, and launch readiness checklists are complete.
- Participate in launch readiness reviews and decide when issues require escalation, delay, or customer alignment.
- Work with Operations, QA, Procurement, Engineering, Regulatory and Sales to resolve risks before first production.
- Ensure post-launch learnings are captured and used to improve future development.
Operational & Technical Partnership - 10%
- Collaborate with Operations and Engineering to ensure new products can be manufactured consistently without relying on heroics.
- Support sensory troubleshooting, ingredient substitutions, product changes, equipment evaluations, and continuous improvement initiatives.
- Ensure product development decisions consider line capability, labour, yields, waste, quality, food safety, and customer expectations.
Qualifications
- Substantial, proven experience with successful new product development and commercialization, ideally with the ability to point to multiple products in the market that you directly helped create and launch.
- Direct experience creating and improving great-tasting food, not only evaluating finished samples.
- Bachelor's degree in Food Science, Food Engineering, Culinary Science, or a related field preferred; significant food manufacturing and product development experience may also be considered.
- 10+ years of food product development experience, preferably in frozen foods, prepared meals, or private label manufacturing.
- 3+ years of leadership experience directly managing one or more direct reports.
- Strong customer presentation, communication, and cross-functional leadership skills.
- Strong understanding of food manufacturing, plant trials, scale-up, sensory quality, cost, margin, and launch readiness.
- Able to prioritize in a fast-paced environment.
- Requires occasional travel throughout Canada and the United States.
Success Criteria
- Long-term product performance in market, including consumer acceptance and product quality.
- Revenue and margin from new products and product changes.
- Customer retention, customer growth.
- Strength, relevance, and readiness of the innovation pipeline.
- First time right trial and 1st productions.
- Achieving planned throughput and quality with new meals.
- Team development and engagement.
Rewards
- Salaried position based on experience and education.
- Short-Term Incentive Plan: Quarterly Incentive Plan tied to Company EBITDA growth, with earning potential of 0–30% above base salary.
- Long Term Incentive Program (LTIP): Eligible to participate in the Company's equity compensation program.
- Four weeks of vacation and five annual personal days.
- Comprehensive health and dental benefits (100% Employer Paid).
- Life, Dependent life and AD&D coverage (100% Employer Paid).
- Long term disability insurance coverage (100% Employee Paid).
- Company matched DPSP program.
Inovata Foods Corp. is an inclusive employer. If selected for an interview, please advise our Human Resources Department if you require any accommodation during the interview and assessment process, and we will work with you to meet your accessibility needs.
