Technician - Food Safety and Quality Assurance

About Vale

Vale is a design-led company building the future of autonomous retail. We blend automation, robotics, and premium food & beverage to create beautifully crafted matcha experiences through fully automated kiosks and mobile carts.

Our mission is simple:
Make Magic. We combine technology and hospitality to create experiences that feel effortless, intuitive, and memorable. We operate a café in Seattle’s South Lake Union and are expanding our event-based Matcha Bar business across the region.

The Quality Technician / FSQA Analyst will support the development, implementation, and maintenance of Vale's Food Safety and Quality Assurance program. This role will be responsible for conducting pre-operational inspections, environmental monitoring, documentation review, product quality checks, and assisting with the creation of policies, procedures, SOPs, and food safety programs. This is a hands‑on role ideal for someone who is comfortable working both in quality assurance and on the production floor.

The right candidate will be detail-oriented, proactive, collaborative, and willing to support production activities as needed while helping strengthen Vale’s food safety culture.

Food Safety & Quality Assurance

• Perform pre-operational inspections to verify equipment, utensils, production areas, and sanitation conditions are acceptable prior to production.
• Conduct routine in-process and finished product quality checks according to established specifications.
• Support environmental monitoring activities, including swabbing, sampling, documentation, and follow‑up on results.
• Assist in allergen control verification, sanitation checks, GMP inspections, and facility hygiene audits.
• Monitor compliance with food safety, quality, sanitation, and regulatory requirements.
• Document non‑conformances and assist with corrective and preventive actions.
• Support investigations related to quality issues, foreign material concerns, customer complaints, or food safety deviations.
• Maintain accurate and organized quality and food safety records.

• Help develop, write, review, and maintain food safety and quality policies, procedures, SOPs, work instructions, forms, and logs.
• Assist with building and maintaining programs related to GMPs, sanitation, allergen control, supplier approval, traceability, recall, pest control, environmental monitoring, preventive controls, and HACCP-based systems.
• Support preparation for third‑party audits, regulatory inspections, customer audits, and certification programs.
• Assist with SQF program development and implementation, as applicable.
• Help identify gaps in existing procedures and recommend improvements.
• Support employee training on GMPs, sanitation, allergen control, food safety procedures, and quality standards.

• Assist with production activities as needed, including staging, packaging, labeling, cleaning, and general production support.
• Work closely with production team members to ensure food safety and quality expectations are met during daily operations.
• Promote a strong food safety culture across the facility.
• Communicate effectively with operations, sanitation, maintenance, and leadership teams.

• Minimum of 2 years of experience in a food manufacturing, food processing, or food production environment.
• Experience with GMPs, sanitation, allergen control, and food safety documentation.
• Strong attention to detail and ability to follow written procedures.
• Ability to accurately complete records, forms, logs, and reports.
• Comfortable working in a production environment and supporting hands‑on operational tasks.
• Strong communication, organization, and problem‑solving skills.
• Ability to work independently and collaboratively with cross‑functional teams.
• Ability to lift 50lbs.

• Bachelor’s degree in Food Science, Microbiology, Biology, Chemistry, or a related field.
• PCQI certification.
• HACCP training or certification.
• SQF Practitioner certification or experience supporting SQF programs.
• Experience working in a facility that handles allergens.
• Experience with environmental monitoring programs.
• Experience writing or developing SOPs, policies, procedures, and food safety documentation.
• Experience with third‑party audits, regulatory inspections, or food safety certification programs.

Relocation support may be available to candidates outside of Seattle.