The Sr. Customer Business Manager, Associated Wholesale Grocers (AWG) will drive sales strategies to grow Danone North American business within Yogurt, Beverage, Plant Based and Happy Family. Be a touchpoint with customers – sharing and selling the Danone NA products to retailers. Understand customer business needs and build short and long-term strategies that support those customer goals while achieving company sales targets and financial expectations. Execute company plan at the customer level – building customer/category plans in coordination with Acosta team. Lead and coordinate cross-functional company efforts with customers (e.g., bring in category, shopper marketing, customer service, etc.) to accomplish customer plan.

Objectives:

• Build and execute the customer plan to grow the business: Coordinate selling process for the given customer /categories to deliver Financial Objectives and prepare / develop / present all Sales / Category (as necessary) related Customer presentations
• Gain a deep understanding of customer needs and priorities (e.g., their KPIs, business/category goals, supply, service, etc.)
• Enhance relationship with customer and Danone NA: Build and maintain relationships with key customer personnel (Category Manager and Cross Functional Partners)
• Develop calendar for customer-touchpoints – define who needs to be involved at each meeting, purpose for each interaction, etc. (top-to-tops, market visits, etc.)
• Manage and take ownership of P&L planning and results for direct business to ensure customers plans are within company Guardrails / VTR expectations and meeting growth targets
• Communicate and work alongside Acosta to ensure implementation of Danone business plans
• Manage total customer spending, deduction management (inclusive of SAN) and pre-pays within Danone NA guidelines
• Deliver in-store execution performance: Help define what success looks like in the store
• Help maintain consistent communication with Customers of all supply chain and service-related topics in coordination with Customer Collaboration
• Maintain DS3 customer specific files
• Provide customer/category feedback internally: Communicate customer needs to internal stakeholders
• Build and utilize Nielsen reporting / Smart reporting / Power BI to research business opportunities focused on assortment optimization, pricing and merchandising that will be presented to the customer
• Lead cross functional team communication (Acosta, category, supply chain, customer service, shopper marketing, etc.) related to promotion, merchandising, and distribution

You will be accountable for:

• • Develop sales/account plans to meet customer objectives while operating within Danone North America corporate initiatives and guidelines (e.g., customized SKUs, operational targets, etc.)
  • Look for opportunities to gain distribution on new products and improve product exposure (shelf positioning, advertising, and promotions) – including monitoring what competitors are doing
  • Maintaining compliance with ANUC Guardrails
  • P&L & Deduction Management / Audit Score compliance of each account
  • Manage the development and delivery for all customer presentations (New Item Meetings, JBP, FMI / NFRA)
  • Represent Danone NA during annual tradeshows, conferences and events attended by customer
  • Lead and communicate all respective plans/execution with Acosta
  • Provide key inputs for demand planning and distributor teams– own the bottom-up forecast, provide key input into the bottom-up forecast
  • Provide category thought leadership and insights from customer to drive both category growth and business across Danone NA
  • Communicate emerging market needs and requirements for product development
  • Communicate and manage outlook of future Purchase Orders and proactively identify potential risks with the Customer