Salt Supply Chain Manager — S&OP Lead

Description

This description provides an overview of the Supply Chain Manager role, covering location, responsibilities, qualifications, and work environment details.

This position is based in Indianapolis, Indiana and requires full-time, on-site attendance Monday through Friday during standard business hours. This role is not eligible for relocation assistance or remote work. Regular in-office attendance is an essential function of this position. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable qualified individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions of the position.

The Supply Chain Manager is responsible for leading the end-to-end supply chain for wholesale salt products, including procurement, supplier management, Sales & Operations Planning, inventory planning, transportation, warehousing, logistics coordination, and customer fulfillment. This role ensures that bulk, packaged, and specialty salt products are sourced, stored, and delivered efficiently, safely, and cost-effectively.

A key deliverable for this position is building and running a disciplined Sales & Operations Planning process that connects site-level demand with supplier-side supply signals, identifies inventory gaps in advance, and supports proactive decisions around sourcing, storage, allocation, and transportation. The role also owns supplier performance management, including quarterly business reviews, supplier scorecards, and key performance indicators.

The ideal candidate will have strong experience managing commodity-based supply chains, freight and logistics operations, vendor relationships, inventory controls, supplier performance, and seasonal demand fluctuations. Experience with road salt, water softener salt, agricultural salt, industrial salt, food-grade salt, or other bulk mineral products is preferred but not required.

• Manage the full supply chain process for wholesale salt products, including procurement, inbound freight, storage, inventory control, outbound logistics, and delivery coordination.
• Build, lead, and continuously improve a formal Sales & Operations Planning process on a regular cadence, aligning customer demand, site-level requirements, supplier capacity, inventory availability, transportation constraints, and seasonal supply needs.
• Partner with sales, operations, finance, customer service, and site leadership to consolidate demand forecasts, evaluate supply commitments, identify inventory gaps or excess positions, and recommend proactive sourcing, allocation, storage, or transportation actions.
• Overlay demand from company sites and customer commitments with supplier-side supply signals to identify potential shortages, timing gaps, inventory imbalances, transportation constraints, or service risks ahead of time.
• Develop and maintain strong relationships with salt mines, producers, importers, packaging suppliers, transportation providers, warehouses, terminals, and third-party logistics partners.
• Serve as the primary relationship owner for key suppliers, maintaining regular communication regarding availability, pricing, lead times, service expectations, quality standards, contract obligations, capacity, and potential supply risks.
• Lead quarterly business reviews with key suppliers, including preparation of performance materials, review of supplier KPIs, discussion of service levels, quality, pricing, lead times, responsiveness, issue resolution, capacity planning, and forward-looking supply risks.
• Develop, monitor, and manage supplier performance KPIs, including on-time delivery, order accuracy, lead-time reliability, product quality, cost performance, fulfillment reliability, responsiveness, issue resolution, and overall supplier scorecard results.
• Monitor inventory levels across bulk terminals, warehouses, yards, and customer-facing distribution points to ensure product availability while minimizing excess carrying costs.
• Plan for seasonal demand, especially for deicing and road salt, by forecasting inventory needs, securing supply commitments, coordinating storage capacity, and preparing transportation plans in advance of peak…