Category Manager - Fruit & Veg

Category Manager - Fruit & Veg

Products are the core of our business. In Fruits & Vegetables, that means ensuring our customers always get the freshest quality, widest seasonal variety, and most competitive prices. With your team, you’ll take full responsibility for this category: building the range, ensuring operational excellence, managing supplier partnerships, and continuously improving both customer satisfaction and profitability.

At Picnic we differentiate ourselves with data. We have state-of-the-art data warehouses, and all our insights and initiatives start with data-driven understanding. Key to your success as Category Manager is combining these insights with your deep knowledge of the fruit & veg market and your strong supplier network to deliver real commercial results.

Tricks of the trade

• Category understanding: Build and develop a deep understanding of the Fruit & Veg category through a combination of Picnic data, customer insights, and supplier input.
• Supply chain optimization: Understand the end-to-end supply chain and identify opportunities to improve the range, product quality, and profitability.
• Fresh excellence: Safeguard product quality, availability, and seasonality across the entire supply chain. Anticipate challenges such as weather impacts, import/export restrictions, and price fluctuations.
• Supplier negotiations: Manage various stakeholders, including design agencies and the supply chain, and run negotiations with suppliers from start to signed contract.
• Supplier relationships: Build strong relationships with Fruit & Veg suppliers, ensuring smooth day-to-day operations while resolving operational challenges.
• Category improvements: Spot trends and innovations in fruit & veg, from local sourcing to sustainability improvements, and translate them into business opportunities.
• Operational optimization: Work closely with supply chain, quality, and design teams to improve assortment, packaging, shelf life, and profitability.
• Team collaboration: Partner with analysts, designers, and supply chain experts to deliver fresh products our customers love.

Your superpowers

• Master’s degree with exposure to analytical problem-solving
• Up to 2 years of work experience, preferably as (junior) category manager and/or buyer in a commercial role within fruit & vegetables
• Proven negotiation skills and the ability to secure competitive deals while building lasting supplier relationships
• Persistence and enthusiasm to drive projects to a successful end result
• Outstanding communication and stakeholder management skills
• Drive to deal with day-to-day operations, swift problem-solving skills
• A genuine passion for fresh products and the dynamics of the fruit & vegetable sector
• Fluency in Dutch and English

Picnic perks

• 🥗Fresh Lunch, coffee, and snacks

Our offices are equipped with fully-fledged coffee bars and a kitchen and chefs. They prepare delicious fresh and warm lunches every day so you can keep your energy up.

• 🚴🏼‍♂️Health insurance discount & bike plan

We have a partnership with CZ (a health insurance provider). Picnic employees get a discount on CZ insurance packages between 5% and 15%. Furthermore, through our partnership with Lease a Bike, you can rent-to-own a new (e)bike at a discounted rate

• ✍🏼 Learning & development

You’ll get ample opportunity to work on yourself at Picnic. We offer personal development through Lepaya courses, Academy trainings, and more. Interested in improving your mental wellbeing? Through OpenUp you get free access to trained psychologists and many courses.

• All the rest

At Picnic you get 25 holidays, we cover your travel expenses and offer a pension plan. And your phone and laptop are on us, as well.