Head of Technical

Our business has a long and proud history of food excellence. We produce award-winning dressings, condiments and marinades for many of the UK’s leading food manufacturers and retailers as well as nurturing our own brands:
Very Lazy® and Newman’s Own® . We believe it’s our passion for good food, fine ingredients and technical excellence that sets us apart and gives us our success.

We’re a spirited, adventurous and resourceful team, and we think these qualities make for something pretty unique and coveted these days. From the mayonnaise and chutneys we create to the management styles and choices we make, everything is guided by our core company values:
Put people first, Bring positive energy, Do the right thing the right way and Be better everyday. It's these values that make us look forward to coming to work every day and make English Provender company a great place to work

This is a senior leadership role with full technical, food safety, quality, and compliance accountability for the Newport manufacturing site, supporting a mixed customer portfolio including major UK Retailers, Quick Service Restaurants (QSR), Business-to-Business (B2B) customers, and export markets.

Reporting into EPCs Technical Director the role is responsible for leading all site technical activities, ensuring the effective delivery of standardised business ways of working including product quality and E2E life cycle ownership, customer requirements, regulatory compliance, audit readiness, and right-first-time product manufacturing. Working in close partnership with Site Operations, Engineering, and Supply Chain, the Customer Head of Technical plays a critical role in driving operational food safety, quality performance, and continuous improvement across the site.

• Act as the primary technical interface for all customers supplied from the site, representing the business at senior technical level.
• Be the voice of the customer on site, ensuring customer standards, codes of practice, and specifications are fully understood and embedded within site operations.
• Lead regular customer technical reviews and KPI performance meetings, maintaining strong, transparent relationships across a mixed customer portfolio.
• Define and deliver the site Customer Technical Strategy, aligned to business objectives, customer requirements, and site capability.
• Actively drive and role‑model a strong food safety and quality culture, ensuring accountability at all levels of the site.
• Maintain effective communication with regulatory bodies and certification bodies where required.

• Hold full accountability for site food safety, quality, and legality, ensuring compliance with UK/EU food law, customer standards, and certification requirements.
• Lead the site Technical team, ensuring effective day‑to‑day management of food safety and quality systems.
• Ensure the site Food Safety Management System (FSMS) is fully implemented, maintained, and continuously improved, including HACCP, prerequisite programmes, TACCP, and VACCP.
• Drive strong operational food safety performance, working closely with Operations to manage risks, deviations, and non‑conformances.
• Ensure the site is maintained in a constant state of audit readiness, with robust internal audit programmes, standards validation, and corrective action management.
• Lead all external audits and inspections (e.g. BRCGS, customer audits, regulatory visits), ensuring effective preparation, execution, and closure of non‑conformances.

• Lead all technical aspects of product introductions and process changes at site level, from concept approval through factory trials to post‑launch review.
• Ensure manufacturing processes, CCPs, quality attributes, and control parameters are clearly defined, validated, and embedded prior to launch.
• Work with Process Technology and Operations teams to ensure safe, robust, and efficient scale‑up and implementation of new products.
• Ensure all products are fully compliant with customer specifications, legal requirements (labelling, allergens, claims), and…