Director, National Distribution

About Us

At Zevia we're creating a world of better-for-you flavor, better for people and the planet. Our team is made up of builders who are passionate about our mission. Together we aim to impact global health, provide affordable better-for-you products, and aid the planet through reduction of plastic. We operate with passion, openness, gratitude, accessibility, humanism, humility, and scrappiness as we fight the good fight to change the beverage industry for good.

Summary

The Director, National Distribution is responsible for driving volume growth and business stability for Zevia’s business with its three largest distributors (UNFI US, UNFI Canada and KeHE). This role is the strategic relationship between Zevia and the distributor leadership, driving accountability to the contract, renegotiating on key business terms and objectives annually, reviewing monthly volume and gap closure initiatives, forecasting, annual business planning, identifying volume opportunity and driving, and managing on-going relationships. This role develops impactful relationships that yield additional volume for Zevia than is otherwise obtained through retailer management teams and resources.

The role is involved in initiative proposals, business planning, target setting, forecasting, and profitability management. This role will mine data sources and distributor reporting to create management dashboards, diagnose and drive volume trends, mine for insights, and build engaging selling stories out of opportunities required for distributor teams to engage with and drive volume for both organizations.

Responsibilities include gaining commitments to support customer programming, communicating inventory flow initiatives between the distributor and Zevia, identifying gaps in inventory to prevent out-of-stocks, working to maintain retailer par levels required to keep Zevia in-stock at shelf, and driving independent distribution growth via accounts not directly called on by Zevia staff (but instead the distributors sales force).  This role builds JBP’s that align with Zevia’s and the distributor’s strategic priorities.  This role creates and manages account budgets that focus on KPIs including price, promotion execution, and quality distribution. Additionally, this role builds customer-facing PowerPoint presentations with the help of the category development team.

Along with these responsibilities, the Director, National Distribution is the lead in the military and food service business, managing relationships with relevant brokers and channel-specific distributors to provide the guidance, tools, and support necessary to expand Zevia’s footprint. 

Essential Functions

Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. 

• Manage national strategic channel specific distributors.
  • Contract negotiation and management with natural channel distributors (UNFI US, CA, and KeHE).
  • Annual business planning; volume, budget, metrics, strategic initiatives.
  • Capitalization on opportunistic business-development volume in other existing or potential channels through brokers and/or broadline/channel specific distributors; mainly foodservice and military.
  • Quarterly business reviews to update distributors and Zevia on business trends, drivers, opportunities, and needs.
• Deliver quality volume growth outpacing general beverage category trends, winning share in natural channel.
  • Monitoring and reporting on high standards of execution by the distributor in Zevia managed accounts.
  • Distributor sales team activation/target setting and results tracking.
  • Business planning; distributor P&L development and delivery.
  • Volume opportunity identification and initiative development.
  • Distribution on priority packages building in keeping with company strategy and plans.
• Create insightful data usage and management across organizations from the sales staff to the executive level.
  • Reporting, dashboards, and ad-hoc analysis to define and drive volume trends.
  • Continuous mining for actionable insights.
  • Development of engaging selling points for account management and distributor negotiations.
  • Accurate forecasting and planning practices.
• Oversee and serve as the main point-of-contact facilitating business development in new channels. 
  • Military and foodservice broker/distributor facilitation and management.
  • Potentially export internationally       via US-based distributors as opportunities arise.
• Represent Zevia in the marketplace with passion, enthusiasm, a positive attitude, a growth mindset and professional demeanor
• Inspire and develop people through coaching and feedback.
• Develop and manage incentives and distributor spending outside of the Zevia managed customer promotional plans.
• Educate, train, and interact with distributor representatives on Zevia’s products, merchandising standards, and sales strategies to drive superior execution in stores.
• Support and evaluate distributor trade shows as necessary.

Preferred Education, Experience and Competencies 

• Five (5) years of distributor management experience, in a similar role or industry.
• Representation and sales experience with a successful history with these distributors.
• Experience using syndicated data sources (i.e., IRI, Nielsen, SPINs).
• Experience with various channels like conventional and natural grocery, mass merch, and convenience.
• Experience working with cross-functional partners (finance, operations, etc.).
• Proven track record of building and developing high performing teams.
• Proven track record of building, presenting, and implementing creative programming.
• Knowledge of beverage category product distribution and the logistics of delivering products to store shelves.
• Detailed knowledge, as well as a history of success managing and growing businesses with distributors, as well as a clear understanding (if not experience in) of chain customer management dynamics. 
• Competent computer skills including Microsoft Suite (Power Point, Word, Excel, Outlook, and Teams).
• Excellent verbal and written communication/presentation and negotiation skills with the ability to listen well and read a situation.
• Aptitude for leading others and building highly productive business relationships with distributors through excellent written and oral communication skills. 
• Strong planning, organizing, and time management skills.
• A deep understanding of the national distributor WOW and strategic growth pillars.
• Ability to create win-win business solutions that resonate with the distributor and the consumer.
• Analytical and engaging.
• Storyteller and critical listener.
• Self-driven to succeed and surpass targets.
• Ability to work independently and make informed decisions independently.
• Team first attitude.
• Strong ability to positively influence others outside of a direct reporting relationship.
• Healthier beverage segment awareness and passion for healthier products.
• Ability to travel via car with a valid driver’s license and untarnished driving record.
• Ability to travel outside of local territory for multiple nights, at least once per month.
• Ability to work flexible hours/weekends as travel and national marketing and consumer events require.

Supervisory Responsibility

This position functions in a supervisor capacity, with direct management responsibilities.

Work Environment

Under normal operations, this position operates in a home office environment for 80% of the time. This role has significant travel requirements of up to 20% with the focus on this travel to be attending customer and Corporate Headquarters (HQ) appointments.

Physical Demands

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job.  The employee is occasionally required to sit; climb or balance; and stoop, kneel, crouch or crawl. The employee must frequently lift and/or move up to thirty (30) pounds and occasionally lift and/or move up to fifty (50) pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, color vision, peripheral vision, depth perception and ability to adjust focus.

Position Type

Full-time, Exempt

Travel

This position requires up to 20% travel.

Work Authorization/Security Clearance

Must be eligible to work in the USA

EEOC Statement

We are committed to providing equal employment opportunities for all qualified job candidates and employees. To that end, Zevia maintains a workplace free of discrimination and harassment on the basis of an individual’s race (including traits historically associated with race, such as hair texture and protective hairstyles such as braids, locks, and twists), color, religion, creed, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, breastfeeding, or related medical condition), gender (including gender identity, gender expression, change of sex, and transgender status), sexual orientation, age, physical or mental disability, pregnancy (including childbirth and breastfeeding), medical condition, national origin, ancestry, marital status (including registered domestic partnership status), civil union status, familial status, military or veteran status, genetic information, caregiver status, citizenship status, immigration status, Civil Air Patrol status, status as a victim of domestic violence, assault, or stalking, or any other characteristic protected by applicable local, state, or federal law (each, a “Protected Characteristic”).

Other Duties

Please note this job description is not designed to cover or contain a comprehensive listing of activities, duties or responsibilities that are required of the employee for this job. Duties, responsibilities, and activities may change at any time with or without notice.