Associate Manager, Portfolio Strategy and Planning

Description

Looking for a job that can grow into a lifelong career?

At Lactalis USA, we believe in promoting from within and giving our employees meaningful opportunities to learn, grow, and thrive. Whether you're just starting out or bringing years of experience, we'll provide the tools and support you need to succeed.

Lactalis is the world leader in dairy—a family‑owned company with over 85,000 pragmatic and ambitious professionals across the globe. Every day, we're proud to produce award‑winning dairy products that bring people together every day.

In the US, we offer an unrivaled house of beloved brands, including Galbani Italian cheeses and ricotta, President specialty cheeses and butters, Kraft natural and grated cheeses, Break stone's cottage cheese, Cracker Barrel, Black Diamond cheddar, and Parmalat milk. Our yogurt portfolio includes siggi's, Stonyfield Organic, Brown Cow, Oui, Yoplait, Go‑Gurt, ratio, Green Mountain Creamery, and Mountain High, along with sour cream and a growing family of ethnic favorites like Karoun, Gopi, and Arz.

At Lactalis, we live by our core values–
Ambition
, Engagement
, and Simplicity
. We’re building a workplace where innovation thrives,

Even if you don’t meet every qualification, we encourage you to apply. We want to hear about your PASSION
, your STORY
, and how your EXPERTISE can help us make an impact.

The Associate Manager, Portfolio Strategy & Planning Manager will contribute to the strategic development, storytelling, commercialization and execution of retail initiatives across retail channels. This role will be the go‑to headquarters partner for the Field Sales team—collaborating throughout the selling process to deliver the strongest, insight‑driven narratives while working internally with Brand Marketing, Supply Chain, Operations, Trade Planning and Finance to ensure optimal execution of priorities.

This role will specifically be responsible for the commercialization of Go‑GURT products, sales strategy and performance analytics. The Associate Manager, Portfolio Strategy & Planning reports to the Senior Manager, Portfolio Strategy & Planning, Yoplait.

• Contribute to the development of the Go‑GURT Sales Strategy, utilizing point of sale data, shopper insights and trends. Partner with the Field Sales team to tailor strategy across customers—prioritizing innovation based on assortment gaps, regional trends, and internal capabilities.
• Manage Innovation Plan, working collaboratively with Marketing to ensure the right innovation is developed and shepherded through the commercialization process. Ensure critical sales deadlines are met without sacrificing the quality of the proposition.
• Utilize category management skills to develop fact‑based sales presentations employing brand research to include customer and consumer syndicated data such as IRI/Circana, AC Nielsen, Numerator. Incorporate this information into ongoing planning and decision making for focus brand(s).
• Collaborate with internal functions and customer teams to create innovative brand solutions to accelerate brand growth that address critical plan risks. Represent the voice of sales to the headquarters teams—ensure clear communication to the field sales team of changes in the plans and implications.
• Provide data‑driven insights of brand(s) business trends, marketing strategies, competitive landscape, and regional/channel risks and opportunities; help develop the strategy that ties brand, category and customer plans together.

• Partner with Demand Planning and Brand Marketing to slime the forecasting process for Go‑GURT. Coordinate the brand Risks & Opportunities, develop communication and action plan. Partner with the customer strategy team to ensure that accepted item volumes, reset timings, and promotions are all accurately reflected in the monthly demand plan.
• Enable connectivity between field sales team and brand team, ensuring appropriate focus on priorities, adherence to brand guidelines and topline partnership from concept to launch.
• Partner with…