Senior Buyer, EMEA

About This Role

At Apeel Sciences, we look to nature to help the global food system improve quality, reduce waste, and ensure an abundant future for our planet. We are seeking an experienced Senior Buyer to support strategic sourcing activities for operations in the European Union. In this role you will successfully source, deliver and manage  the procurement of goods and services to support Apeel’s regional integrations and general purchasing. You will support the design of the global supply chain strategy to support the relevant stakeholder teams on supply chain management best practices and purchase order execution. We expect our Senior Buyer to develop strategic relationships and agreements with suppliers while maintaining the highest level of professional and ethical conduct.

This role is located in De Lier, South Holland, and reports directly to our Senior Director of Purchasing. We are looking for someone to join us immediately.

What You’ll Do

• Responsible for strategic sourcing key equipment, raw product ingredients, services and the management of suppliers
• Develop proposals, generate competitive bids, obtain necessary purchasing approvals, and negotiate contract terms
• Finalize purchasing agreements and expedite order(s) if needed to ensure contract terms are met
• Continue to purchase assigned goods and services per contract while working to improve quality, delivery, price to optimize the supply chain
• Generate the most suitable purchasing agreements such as contracts, blanket orders and vendor stocking arrangements to streamline and obtain optimum pricing and delivery
• Design and manage procurement Standard Operating Procedures (SOP’s) to drive business continuous improvement across Apeel
• Maintain the integrity of the ERP purchasing system database, investigate purchase order or inventory discrepancies, resolve delivery/receiving and payment issues in a timely manner
• Maintain direct contact with suppliers to ensure the quality and quantity of products, parts, and services
• Issue Supplier Corrective Action Required (SCAR) letters if goods or services are compromised
• Routinely provide qualitative and quantitative supplier feedback in addition to scorecard information to ensure supplier performance against KPIs on top tiered suppliers
• Analyze incoming requisitions and shortage reports for quality, specification, pricing and delivery requirements and drive timely execution to support service level agreements (SLA’s)
• Execute all manufacturing purchase orders on a timely basis generated from the ERP supply planning module to support inventory safety stock levels
• Establish cost reduction targets by commodity or strategic category
• Present supplier strategies to cross functional teams or management in presentations and technical reports
• Support and consult with cross-functional teams to deliver on strategic project objectives aligned with Apeels Product Life Cycle
• Participate and support supplier quality audits

What You Bring

Minimum Qualifications

• 5 plus years as an experienced Sr. Buyer with a Bachelor’s degree; or 3 years and a Master’s degree
• Experience purchasing and supporting high volume manufacturing
• Thorough knowledge of procurement, vendor management, material planning, manufacture costing and inventory management
• Familiar with GMP’s (Good Manufacturing Processes), product specifications, incoming inspection procedures and lot control or part serialization
• Effective verbal and written communication, analytical and interpersonal skills;
• Must have the ability to prepare and deliver effective presentations to Sr. Management;
• Strong organizational skills and detail oriented to drive transaction accuracy;
• Strong influencing, negotiating and contracting skills
• Experience with ERP systems and supplier management modules
• Must be willing and able to travel periodically
• Ability to interface well with cross-functional teams
• A desire to be a part of and lead highly motivated teams in a high growth company
• Strong analytical skills with proficiency in Microsoft Excel, Power Point, Google Suite.

Preferred Qualifications

• A CPIM, CPM, CSCP certification from the Association for Supply Chain Management (ASCM) is desirable
• Bilingual with fluency in Spanish is desirable
  

Apeel believes that the scale of our impact is determined by the teams that work with us. As such, we seek to build high-performing teams of people from various experiences and backgrounds who can collectively push our company into new realms. We seek a diverse pool of applicants and consider all qualified candidates regardless of race, ancestry, color, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, religion, national origin, citizenship, disability, Veteran status, marital status, or any other protected status. If you have a special need or disability that requires accommodation, please let us know.