| Location | San Ramon, CA |
Trident Consulting is seeking a " Senior Food Category Manager” for one of our clients in California
Role: Senior Food Category Manager
Location: California - The selected candidate will be placed at the nearest company location within California.
Employment Type: Contract
Senior Food Category Manager | California
We are looking for an experienced Senior Food Category Manager to lead strategic sourcing, category management, supplier relationships, and procurement initiatives across food-related categories.
This is an excellent opportunity for a procurement professional with strong experience in foodservice, food distribution, hospitality, healthcare foodservice, higher education dining, or related commercial procurement.
Key Responsibilities
• Develop and execute strategic category and sourcing strategies
• Lead supplier selection, negotiations, RFP/RFQ processes, and contract management
• Analyze market trends, pricing, spend, and supplier performance to identify savings opportunities
• Manage strategic supplier relationships and drive performance, quality, cost, and service improvements
• Partner with internal stakeholders to understand business requirements and develop effective sourcing solutions
• Drive cost optimization, risk mitigation, and supply continuity initiatives
• Develop category reports, KPIs, spend analysis, and executive-level recommendations
• Support procurement transformation and continuous improvement initiatives
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams including Finance, Operations, and Supply Chain
• Travel approximately 25% to locations across California
Requirements
• 8+ years of experience in strategic sourcing, category management, supply chain, foodservice procurement, food distribution, hospitality procurement, or related commercial procurement
• Strong experience with supplier management, contract negotiations, and competitive sourcing
• Excellent analytical, negotiation, communication, and stakeholder-management skills
• Experience managing complex categories and significant spend portfolios
• Foodservice, higher education dining, healthcare foodservice, or food distribution experience is highly preferred
• Must be able to reside in California
About Trident Consulting
Trident Consulting is an award-winning staffing and consulting firm headquartered in San Ramon, CA. Since 2005, we've partnered with Fortune 500 and high-growth companies to deliver high-quality talent across technology, engineering, business operations, and professional services.
We specialize in contract, contract-to-hire, and direct hire placements, supporting roles across IT, data & analytics, cloud, cybersecurity, finance & accounting, HR, operations, and more. With a strong focus on hard-to-fill and niche positions, our global recruiting engine enables us to deliver speed, quality, and scale.