Associate Director International Procurement

As an Associate Director, Procurement, you will report to the Procurement Director and own the strategy, performance, and people development for your category cluster. You will lead a team of Category Managers, set the direction for supplier relationships and commercial outcomes, and operate as the senior point of escalation across operational and strategic procurement challenges.

What you'll do

• Define and own the multi-year category strategy for your cluster sourcing model, supplier segmentation, risk posture, and cost ambition and present that strategy coherently to Director-level stakeholders.
• Translate market intelligence (commodity dynamics, seasonality, geopolitical risk, supply constraints) into actionable procurement decisions and communicate them with clarity and confidence.
• Build and steward the most strategically important supplier relationships in your cluster, including joint investment plans, multi-year contracts, and structured partnership governance.
• Lead or oversee tender processes end-to-end from strategy and data-pack through to award, contract, and supplier briefing at pace and to a high standard of documentation.
• Take full commercial accountability for your cluster's cost performance, savings targets, and COGS variance ensuring outcomes are tracked, explained, and acted upon.
• Lead, coach and develop a team of Category Managers, creating a high-performance environment that is psychologically safe, commercially ambitious, and genuinely invested in its people.
• Build and maintain strong working relationships with Product, Supply Chain Operations, FSQA, Finance, and Legal representing Procurement credibly and influencing decisions in cross-functional forums.

What you'll need

• 7+/9+ years in strategic procurement, supply chain, or a closely related commercial discipline ideally in FMCG, or food ingredients, though we care more about the quality of thinking than the specific category.
• Demonstrated track record of building supplier relationships at a strategic level, including contract negotiation, partnership governance, and managing through disruption.
• Experience setting and executing category strategy across a meaningful portfolio ideally managing a cluster of subcategories or a team.
• Proven ability to lead and develop others, whether as a formal team lead or through mentoring, cross-functional project leadership, or stepping up in an interim capacity.
• Strategically confident: you can connect day-to-day procurement decisions to a longer-term commercial and supply chain vision, and you communicate that narrative clearly to senior audiences.
• Data-driven: comfortable building investment cases, analyzing COGS variance, and driving evidence-based decision-making within your team.

What they offer

• Competitive compensation package with subsidized Pension Scheme
• Berlin relocation support and Hybrid working model
• HelloFresh box discounts and office meal benefits
• Annual learning and development budget plus German language learning
• Mental health support, 24/7 gym access, and working-parent-friendly benefits
• Sabbatical leave options and wellbeing platforms like Headspace and Spill