Key Account Manager US
Location: Remote-based (preferred near major dairy/food manufacturing hubs)
Reports to: Head of Business Development – North America
Department: Commercial / Business Development
Travel: Up to 50% (domestic travel to clients, trade shows, and Frulact facilities)
Company Overview:
Frulact is a global leader in the development and production of value-added fruit preparations and innovative food solutions for the dairy, plant-based, beverage, and bakery industries. With operations in Europe, North America, and beyond, we partner with some of the most recognized food brands in the world. Frulact is built on a culture of innovation, customer collaboration, and sustainability.
Position Summary:
The Business Developer Manager - Bakery is responsible for driving strategic commercial relationships with key food manufacturers in the U.S., ensuring sustained growth and customer satisfaction. This individual will also be responsible for identifying and converting new business opportunities in line with Frulact’s strategic priorities. The ideal candidate is a results-driven, entrepreneurial commercial professional with strong industry knowledge and a passion for developing partnerships that deliver long-term value. A person who is persistent and resilient, who thrives in a challenging environment will do well in this role.
A Business Development manager will need to have a hunter skillset, we are looking for a person who aggressively identifies, pursues, and closes new accounts. A person who is comfortable opening doors with cold outreach, networking, trade shows and competitive account targeting.
We are also looking for a person with a deep understanding of bakery categories, knowledge of ingredients, formulations, shelf life, etc., someone who understands cost-drivers who can turn bakery capabilities into customer-specific propositions.
Key Responsibilities:
Account Management
- Manage and grow a portfolio of key customers in the bakery sector.
- Serve as the primary commercial contact for strategic accounts, building trusted relationships at multiple levels (procurement, R&D, marketing, operations).
- Lead annual planning, pricing negotiations, and strategic reviews with customers.
- Ensure flawless execution of customer projects by collaborating cross-functionally with R&D, supply chain, operations, and quality.
New Business Development
- Identify, prioritize, and close new commercial opportunities aligned with Frulact’s value proposition.
- Aggressively identify, pursue and close new accounts.
- Comfortable openings doors with cold outreach.
- Conduct market mapping to uncover mid-size and emerging food manufacturers requiring fruit and plant-based ingredients.
- Lead customer engagement from first contact through onboarding, leveraging Frulact’s innovation, R&D, and manufacturing capabilities.
- Represent Frulact at trade shows, conferences, networking, distributor leads and innovation forums.
Strategy and Reporting
- Develop and execute account and territory growth plans.
- Monitor KPIs (revenue, margin, volume, pipeline health) and report progress monthly to management.
- Feed market insights back into Frulact’s strategic planning and innovation roadmap.
Qualifications:
Required
- Bachelor’s degree in food science, Business, Marketing, or related field.
- 5+ years of experience in B2B sales or key account management in the Bakery field;
- Proven track record of growing key accounts and developing new business.
- Understanding of the Bakery market in North America.
- Strong communication, negotiation, and project management skills.
Key Attributes for Success:
- Focus: Acquire new bakery customers and open new markets (there will be an influx of 3-6 customers which need to be further developed and need to be leveraged for new account development)
- Works from a long prospect list
- Comfortable with cold outreach, networking, and rejection
- Highly proactive and opportunity-driven
- Thrives in ambiguous situations
- Success metric: new pipeline and revenue generated
