Production Planning Manager

Samworth Brothers Ltd; Leicester; On-site; GBP 45,000 - 60,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading food manufacturing company in Leicester is seeking a Planning Manager to oversee the Saladworks Production Planning function. This pivotal role involves ensuring business plans, customer service levels, and operational KPIs are met in a complex chilled ready-meals environment. Ideal candidates will have extensive experience in FMCG manufacturing and leading teams under pressure. Join to be part of a collaborative family environment that values employee contribution and growth opportunities.

Benefits

Enhanced pension scheme

Private health scheme

Employee discount scheme

Annual pay reviews

Profit related pay

Training and growth opportunities

Qualifications

• Proven experience as an Operational / Production Planning Manager within FMCG manufacturing.
• Strong background in chilled or short shelf-life food.
• Experience leading planning teams in a high-pressure, fast-moving environment.

Responsibilities

• Lead end-to-end production and demand planning.
• Own the site planning horizon, ensuring plans are achievable.
• Proactively identify risks and lead mitigation activities.
• Lead, coach, and develop the Production Planning team.
• Act as the planning interface between departments.

Skills

Operational / Production Planning experience

Understanding of chilled food production

Leadership in high-pressure environments

Capacity and material planning knowledge

Planning systems experience

Tools

Microsoft Dynamics

Infor System 21

Preactor

Relex

Job description

About The Role

Join the Samworth Brothers Team and become part of our dynamic family!

At Samworth Brothers, we genuinely care about our colleagues and strive to create an engaging environment that values your unique contributions. We are committed to your success and offer a range of exceptional benefits that we believe supports your life and personal aspirations:

• Enhanced pension scheme
• Private health scheme
• Employee discount scheme
• Experience annual pay reviews
• Profit related pay
• Unlock your potential through training and growth opportunities

The Opportunity

In this role as Planning Manager, you will lead the Saladworks Production Planning function, ensuring we deliver our business plan, customer service levels and operational KPIs in a complex, chilled ready‑meals environment. You’ll provide clear direction across production and demand planning, ensuring plans are robust, achievable and aligned to capacity, labour and material availability.

This role is central to driving engagement, capability and performance within the Planning team, while supporting the wider site strategy through strong cross‑functional collaboration and continuous improvement.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead end‑to‑end production and demand planning, balancing short‑term execution with medium‑term optimisation
• Own the site planning horizon, ensuring daily, weekly and period plans are achievable and clearly communicated
• Proactively identify risks to service, cost or efficiency and lead mitigation activity
• Lead, coach and develop the Production Planning team, building capability and accountability
• Act as the planning interface between Operations, Commercial, Supply Chain, Engineering and Technical

The Ideal Candidate

We believe that success is built upon collaboration and diverse perspectives. At Samworth Brothers, we welcome candidates who are passionate about working together to achieve greatness. As a valued member of our team, you will bring the following skills and experience:

• Proven experience as an Operational / Production Planning Manager within FMCG manufacturing
• Strong background in chilled or short shelf‑life food
• Experience leading planning teams in a high‑pressure, fast‑moving environment
• Strong knowledge of capacity, labour and material planning
• Experience with planning systems such as Microsoft Dynamics, Infor System 21, Preactor, Relex or similar

We also want you to thrive in an engaging and inclusive work culture where you will have the opportunity to take on personal accountability and take pride in your work. We encourage positive communication, and the building of strong collaborative relationships is essential to every role.

Join us at Samworth Brothers, where you'll be more than just a team member – you'll be an integral part of our thriving family. Apply today and embark on an exciting journey with us!

About Us

We are a fourth‑generation family business producing high quality own‑label products for many of the UK’s best‑known retailers along with our own brands including Ginsters, Soreen, Higgidy, Dickinson & Morris, Urban Eat, West Cornwall Pasty Company and Walker & Son. We employ over 10,000 people in well‑invested modern food manufacturing sites around the country.

At Samworth Brothers we take pride in our family feel within our businesses and work together to make things happen. We can offer you the stability of a wider group as well as the opportunities that that offers if you wish to progress your career with us. We are family and we would like to invite you to be part of that and support our teams in delivering great products to all of our customers.

Samworth Brothers do not engage with unlicensed gangmasters or third parties. Samworth Brothers will NEVER ask you for money in order to provide you with employment. If you are in any doubt, please contact an official Samworth Brothers representative.