Supply Chain Category Manager - Indirect Spend - Q-Qdoba Brand Central (San Diego, CA)

The Category Manager – Indirect Spend will design, execute, and oversee strategic sourcing initiatives across key indirect categories that support Restaurant Operations, including FF&E, Services, Facilities, and Construction-related spend. This individual will manage a spend portfolio of roughly $35M–$45M, optimizing costs without compromising on operational efficiency or guest experience. This role leads category strategy development, sourcing governance, supplier relationship management, and contract optimization to deliver sustainable value, reduce enterprise risk, and support long-term business growth. The ideal candidate brings a strong blend of strategic sourcing expertise, financial and analytical acumen, executive-level communication, and cross-functional leadership to influence decisions and drive enterprise-wide outcomes.

Key Duties and Responsibilities:

• Category Strategy: Develop multi-year strategies that optimize total cost of ownership, strengthen supplier capabilities, and improve service performance. Consider market intelligence, internal spend analysis, and cross-functional timelines in decision-making. Mitigate supply chain risks through vendor diversification, assessment of raw material supply, production capacity and capability, and geographic location as it pertains to the proximity to restaurants. Create strategic plans to respond to findings.
• Strategic Sourcing & RFPs: Lead end-to-end strategic sourcing events (RFI/RFP/RFQ), including vendor identification, market analysis, negotiation of commercial terms (warranty), service enhancement, stakeholder alignment, and final award recommendations that align with long-term business objectives.
• Contract Management: Review or draft, negotiate, and execute Master Service Agreements (MSAs), Scope of Work (SOWs), Service Level Agreements (SLAs), and key legal definitions in partnership with the Chief Supply Chain Officer, VP of Global Sourcing, or Legal.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Partner and build strong relationships with internal partners across Restaurant Development, Design, Facilities, Operations, Culinary, Marketing, and other senior stakeholders to align sourcing strategies with business priorities and operational standards. Provide strategic leadership around implementation of projects, ensuring alignment among franchise and company stakeholders, disciplined execution, and timely communication of decisions, risks, and results. Partner with stakeholders to define business requirements, assess category and supplier landscapes, evaluate products, and develop recommendations.
• Supplier Relationship Management (SRM): Monitor vendor KPIs, score-carding, conduct quarterly business reviews with tier-1 suppliers, and aggressively resolve service escalations. Serve as the primary relationship owner for key suppliers, driving performance management, executive business reviews, and continuous improvement and accountability. Identify strategic supplier partnerships that support innovation, scalability, and competitive advantage.
• Cost Savings & Compliance: Identify and track annual cost-reduction targets, enforcing compliance with approved Brand standard programs across all corporate and franchise locations. Drive cost savings, cost avoidance, and value creation through analytics, benchmarking, and supplier collaboration.

Core Competencies & Leadership Style

Program Builder: A builder mindset with a proven ability to architect, implement, and scale procurement processes, toolkits, and playbooks entirely from the ground up

• Thrives in Ambiguity: Highly resourceful and comfortable operating in environments where data may be scattered, guidelines are unwritten, or infrastructure is still in development; views undefined spaces as an opportunity to innovate rather than a roadblock.
• Executive Presence: Strong communication and presentation skills, with the ability to distill financial data and supply chain logistics into clear detail for C-suite and executive leadership audiences. Ability to influence decision-making at senior levels and guide stakeholders through a structured sourcing and governance process.
• Leadership: Demonstrated assertive leadership in guiding cross-functional stakeholders toward aligned decisions without direct supervisory authority. Self-driven, results-focused, and able to operate with minimal oversight while maintaining high quality, accuracy, and compliance to Brand objectives.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in supply chain, Business Administration, Finance, or an equivalent amount of experience.
• 7 years’ experience required in lieu of a degree.
• 3 years of experience in strategic sourcing or corporate procurement, with at least 2 years focused specifically on Indirect categories
• Industry Experience: Background in restaurant, hotel, retail, or foodservice environment is highly preferred.
• Technical Skills: Advanced proficiency in Microsoft Excel (VLOOKUPs, pivot tables, cost modeling).
• Problem-Solving Skills: Strong analytical mindset with the ability to turn raw spend data into actionable financial insights. Ability to develop business cases and drive cost savings.
• Resourcefulness: Demonstrated ability to scrape, clean, and leverage fragmented data to form a cohesive procurement strategy despite undefined process.
• Program Management: Excellent organizational skills with the ability to balance multiple high-stakes RFP timelines, contract renewals, and unexpected supply chain disruptions simultaneously.

REASONABLE ACCOMMODATION:

Qdoba and its affiliates will make reasonable accommodations to allow a qualified individual with a disability to enjoy equal employment opportunities and to perform the essential functions of the job. This position description should be applied accordingly.

Benefits:

• Medical, Dental, Vision, &
• 401kPTO (including vacation and sick)
• Tuition reimbursement

Pay Range: $95,600 to $105,000

CA Notice of Collection:

https://www.qdoba.com/notice-of-collection-for-california-employees

Privacy Policy:

https://www.qdoba.com/privacy

QDOBA takes pride in carefully selecting talented people and mixing them together to discover amazing flavors. We value the diversity that all our employees bring to the table and the new flavors they bring to our team. Employment decisions and rewards recognize job accountabilities, business needs, and performance merit without regard to age, gender, race, religious affiliation, Veteran status, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, or any other protected classification recognized by applicable federal, state, or local law.