Head of Flavor & Sensory

Together We Innovate.

Together We Change.
What if the next frontier of growth isn't just what we make, but how precisely we shape how it's experienced, and how flavor and sensory can become a scalable engine of innovation and connection? This role elevates them into a strategic lever, uniting science, insights, and product development to drive compelling experiences and stronger market impact.

We are actively recruiting the Head of Flavor & Sensory to join our Growth Organization in Richmond, VA or we are open to remote work arrangements.

Must be willing to travel as needed, approximately 30-40%.

The Head of Flavor & Sensory will own and lead a critical capability at the heart of product differentiation, translating flavor and sensory science into consumer preference and commercial advantage.

By integrating technical expertise, insights, and innovation, this role will transform flavor and sensory into a strategic system that consistently delivers superior, consumer-winning experiences.
What you'll be doing:
Define Strategy and Superiority
• Define consumer-winning sensory ambition and translate insights into clear category targets and product priorities
• Establish "where to play/how to win" strategies and define superiority scorecards and evidence standards
Build Capability & Innovation
• Evolve flavor and sensory capabilities, standards, and differentiated product-experience systems
• Build benchmarking, modeling, long-term capability, talent, and innovation roadmap
Integrate the Capability System
• Integrate cross-functional expertise (sensory, R&D, analytics, regulatory, etc.) into a unified product-experience system
Enable Delivery, Govern Validation and Evidence
• Deploy capabilities into priority programs with clear ownership, portfolio management, and operating standards
• Define validation frameworks and integrate consumer, sensory, and technical evidence into decisions and learning loops
Lead the External Ecosystem and Knowledge System
• Build and manage strategic external partnerships to accelerate innovation
• Standardize knowledge capture and reuse across tools, insights, and future development
Measure Performance and Impact
• Define KPIs and use insights to improve delivery, resourcing, and ways of working
• Build team capability and succession pipeline to sustain long-term advantage
We want you to have:


* Bachelor's or master's degree in food science, Chemistry, Consumer Science, or a related technical field


* 15+ years related experience in flavor, sensory, product development , consumer science or related technical fields


* Experience leveraging external partners to accelerate capability and innovation design and technology development)


* Demonstrated experience defining flavor, sensory, or product-experience strategy across categories or platforms.


* Strong technical credibility across flavor, sensory, product development, and related analytical or product-science disciplines.
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