Senior Manager, Procurement - Packaging at Zep Inc in Atlanta, Georgia

Job Description:

Are you looking to join a company who believes in fostering an environment for associates to grow and achieve their career goals? Zep Inc. Associates create the framework of the company's success through championing our brands, developing new products and working towards the company's growth aspirations. Our commitment to maintaining a safe working environment, to excellent career advancement opportunities and to competitive benefits packages makes Zep Inc. an exciting organization for those professional seeking not just a job, but a life-long career.

Job Description:

The Senior Manager, Procurement - Packaging role will be responsible for developing, executing, and managing corporate procurement initiatives for all packaging commodities. The role will perform data analysis to identify new sourcing & other cost optimization opportunities to generate savings for categories managed. The position will work collaboratively with internal departments to facilitate, optimize, and execute the purchase and corporate governance of these spend commodities within the organization.

Primary Accountabilities:

• Develop, implement, and manage a strategy to optimize the value of applicable direct spend commodity to increase overall contribution margin to the business.


• Provide forecasting and explanations of various financial metrics such as / but not limited to; PPV, material standards, savings/deflation, inventory turns, material variances, etc.


• Oversee contract development and administration.


• Identify and leverage company-wide spend opportunities.


• Lead supplier selection & recommendation activities including qualitative/quantitative analysis, selection criteria, RFI/RFP development, and bid analysis.


• Lead implementation activities for commodities with critical impacts to business and internal customers.


• Monitor compliance with supplier agreements related to responsible commodities.


• Establish and implement methods and best practices related to monitoring currency, material indexes, and category related trends to proactively manage spend and supplier base to ensure spend is optimized.


• Negotiate prices, terms, and quality requirements with domestic and international suppliers for assigned commodities.


• Provide customer service to key company end-users, as well as interfacing with key support groups to resolve issues.


• Support the procure-to-pay process ensuring all documentation is complete and accurate.


• Assure preventive and corrective action is taken with suppliers to eliminate causes of actual or potential quality and delivery issues.


• Participate and support recurring meetings with marketing and R&D to support productivity, VAVE, Quality and Operational projects related to category of responsibility.


• Build and Execute tools and business processes to drive vendor strategy and monitor vendor performance.


• Manage day-to-day transactional and administrative issues related to RFQ/RFP's, supply agreements, pricing updates, and supplier set up.


• Liaison between the supply base and other internal departments.

Experience and Skills:

• Bachelor's Degree in business, engineering, materials science or related field (Technical preferred)


• 10+ years of commodity management and progressive Sourcing experience


• Working knowledge and understanding of SAP/ERP/MRP systems and their use in a manufacturing environment.


• Demonstrated ability to identify, leverage, and implement metrics and other tools to drive supplier performance.


• Proven leader with strategy development and deployment experience


• Travel required to various facilities in the company & suppliers / seminars is expected, travel anticipated to be 20%.


• Data analysis and problem solving are required in the position.

• APICS/CPIM/CPM/CPSM (ISM) certifications preferred


• Master of Business Administration is a plus

• Experience with ISO quality systems a plus


• Efficient with SAP

Zep Inc. is an organization that is committed to diversity within its workforce and encourages all interested candidates, including women, minorities, & former military personnel to apply. It is the policy of Zep Inc. that all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, gender, age, disability or sexual orientation.