Business Development Manager

Experience selling in Food and Drink Field Based Business Development Manager UK field based £45,000 basic plus commission and car allowance First sales hire in the UK for a growing drinks brand. This isn't a territory handed to you with a pipeline attached and a manager checking your CRM twice a week. It's a blank map, a product people genuinely like, and the freedom to go and build it.

The business already has a foothold here. What it doesn't have yet is someone on the ground making it happen properly. That's the job. What you'll be doing Growing wallet share across the existing wholesale network, getting more of the range into the accounts that already stock it. Winning new wholesale listings and building the routes to market that don't exist yet.

Targeting food service and convenience across the UK, from independent coffee shops to convenience symbol groups. Spending your time where the decisions get made. This is a boots on the ground role — walking into coffee shops and convenience stores, talking to owners, getting the product on the shelf and then making sure it sells through. Building the commercial foundations that whoever comes after you will inherit.

Who this suits Someone who has sold in drinks, or in food and drink more broadly, and knows how wholesale, food service and convenience actually work. Someone who prefers being out than being in. If your best days are the ones spent driving between accounts rather than sitting in review meetings, you'll recognise yourself here. Someone comfortable being the first. There's no playbook, no team around you yet, and no one to hand the difficult calls to.

That's either the appeal or the problem, and you'll know which. Someone who can hold their own with an owner-operator and a national buyer on the same day. What's on offer £45,000 basic, with commission on top and a car allowance. Genuine autonomy over how you run your patch and your week. The chance to be the person who built the UK business, with the progression that tends to follow when you do that well.

Interested? Send your CV to or call Bridget Holder for a confidential chat. Happy to talk it through informally if you're curious rather than actively looking.