About Ben & Jerry’s
Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Inc., started in 1978 in a renovated gas station in Burlington, Vermont, USA, founded by childhood friends and dedicated activists Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield. In 2000 Ben & Jerry’s became a wholly owned autonomous subsidiary of Unilever with a unique governance structure that provides for an independent Board of Directors vested with primary responsibility for advancing Ben & Jerry’s social mission and ensuring the essential integrity of the brand.
Ben & Jerry’s is one of Unilever’s most valuable and iconic brands, with annual turnover exceeding €1 Billion, and with high ambitions to double the business, and expand its impact throughout the world. Central to the mission of Ben & Jerry’s is the belief that all three parts of its mission must thrive equally. This translates into a high-paced growth environment without compromising our grassroots and activist spirit. That is how we remain a true purpose-led organization with a connected 3-part mission, which you will find reflected in our KPI’s.
Ben & Jerry’s 3-Part Mission:
Social mission: We initiate innovative ways to improve the quality of life locally, nationally, and internationally specifically on Climate Justice, Social Justice, Racial Justice, and Economic Justice
Product mission: We make and distribute the finest quality natural ice cream and euphoric concoctions.
Economic mission: We operate our Company for sustainable, Profitable financial growth.
Who You Are and What You’ll Do:
We are looking for an intelligent, innovative, and creative Marketer with a passion for brands. The ideal candidate will drive the business forward with out-of-the-box ideas, strong leadership of a cross-functional team, and by challenging the status quo to get things done more efficiently. This position will require an in-depth understanding of brand development, which includes market trends, consumer insight, and category dynamics. The role will require both strategic thinking and executional excellence to continue growing Ben & Jerry’s.
Ben & Jerry’s is a $1B+ brand globally and the US is our birthplace & largest market. This role is highly strategic and critical for landing the future ambition for Ben & Jerry’s. The individual in this role will lead several exciting product innovation initiatives to launch over the next 2-5 years.
Associate Brand Manager for Ben & Jerry’s US Innovation will be held accountable for leading development of new products, packaging, and advertising.
- Execute new product initiatives in partnership with Marketing, Supply Chain, and R&D that fulfil company strategies, support the social mission, and meet financial objectives for sales, gross margin and profitability.
- Lead projects cross-departmentally to ensure that key milestones are met and goals achieved. Brings inconsistencies and problems to the attention of management.
- Collaborate with Consumer Marketing Research in primary consumer research, leading the development of consumer stimulus. Drive secondary research for trend reporting. Utilize results in planning efforts.
- Provide business analysis to support new product development. Study syndicated data and create competitive intelligence reports. Prepare moderately complex and varied analytical reports. Develop findings and recommendations for management review.
- Develop stage-gate documents to include compiling information from cross-functional team members and regional marketing teams.
- Work closely with Design on execution of new product packaging and artwork for product concepts.
- Partner closely with the Brand Operations marketing team to ensure flawless execution in market.
- Support Brand Operations teams in the planning of both short and long-term business and marketing initiatives. Coordinate execution of marketing materials requested by Regional and local teams.
- Exhibit commitment to the brand’s social mission and Marketing’s vital role in delivering all three elements of Ben & Jerry’s three-part mission statement. Work with the Social Mission team to integrate the social mission into individual marketing plans.
You’re a born leader: This position requires strong leadership skills as you will interact with cross-functional business partners, brand partners in multiple categories as well as agencies. Having a vision and strategic intent will be critical to deliver impactful communications and creative.
You generate powerful insights: Our work starts with understanding what drives our consumers to purchase, and crafting plans based on those insights, including nuances based on the shopping occasion and retail channel. This position will require the ability to write up and validate consumer concepts for innovations and communications.
What You’ll Need to Succeed:
- Bachelor degree required, MBA preferred with 2-3 years’ experience CPG innovation workstreams with understanding of digital and e-commerce and strong analytical skills
- Clear demonstration of successful, consistent delivery to the business
- Clear demonstration of project management & leadership skills
- Experience working with agencies and media partners
- Experience working with different customer channels
- Ability to operate in a fast-paced, dynamic environment, and to provide innovative approaches in a team-based structure
- Ability to deliver both verbal and written communication in a simple, compelling manner.
- Ability to think strategically, both from a brand and portfolio view
Over the past years, we have dedicated ourselves in new ways to understanding and developing strategies for the deep work necessary to uproot the systemic racism underpinning our racial inequity. Ben & Jerry’s is committed to becoming a truly antiracist company by eliminating racial disparities within the company and to disproportionately create Black wealth through our business relationships.
We are actively working to achieve equity in our workforce, franchise network and supplier base through a wide range of ongoing and evolving strategies that eliminate barriers, increase access to opportunity, and make real changes in our business practices and culture. This work will be supported by goals and internal metrics to maintain and report on our progress.
We have chosen to center on racial equity out of an understanding that the culture of white supremacy must be dismantled to achieve equity for all marginalized people. We have focused our strategies on outcomes for Black people because slavery and its legacy remain such a defining element of American life. We believe this targeted work will help us achieve our broader commitment to universal social equity.
The initial phase of this work focuses on our home market of the U.S., where the majority of our employees and business is located. As we learn and build our capacity for this work, we will expand it to our global markets where systemic racism in other forms, with roots in colonialism, persists.