Job Description:
The Director, Category & Insights leads the North America Category Center of Excellence (COE), responsible for defining and deploying Mars Pet Nutrition’s category vision, insights frameworks, and growth strategies across channels and customers.
This role owns the development of a 3–5 year category vision, shopper-led growth strategies, and a standardized category toolkit, enabling field category and customer teams to deliver best-in-class execution and retailer engagement.The Director will also lead the SLIC (Shopper Learning & Innovation Center) as a strategic, customer-facing capability to bring category insights, innovation, and growth stories to life with retail partners.
As a key leader within the Category Leadership team, this role drives a ONE Category Management operating model, connects insights to commercial activation, and ensures Mars is positioned as the category thought leader across brick & mortar and omni environments.
This role is based in Franklin, TN with regular in-office collaboration expected. Flexibility is a key enabler—empowering associates to make choices that support both business outcomes and personal needs, including occasional remote work.
What are we looking for?Lead the creation of category growth stories and retailer-facing narratives that enable sales teams to sell total category solutions.
Define the “perfect store” and “perfect digital shelf” picture of success across channels.
Establish frameworks for assortment, shelving, pricing, promotion, and activation that drive category growth.
Ensure strategies reflect both brick & mortar constraints, including space and merchandising, and omnichannel dynamics such as search, personalization, and the digital shelf.
Define and implement the ONE Category Management operating model in partnership with sales leadership, and embed COE capability into Business Management Teams (BMTs) to enable a ONE Demand mindset.
Partner with AOE Customer Excellence, Marketing, SRM, and Insights to ensure integrated category strategies.
Own the development of a best-in-class category toolkit that includes a shopper insights foundation, category vision and growth platforms, the role of brands in category growth, distribution, activation and PPP (price-pack-promo) strategies, and a total category picture of success across both brick & mortar and digital environments.
Standardize tools and processes that can be scaled across customers and channels and ensure toolkits enable proactive opportunity creation versus reactive reporting in field teams.
Increase the frequency and impact of customer engagements hosted through SLIC and bring category strategies to life through immersive retail and shopper experiences, product demonstrations and shelf simulations, and digital and physical ecosystem storytelling.
Develop bold, differentiated recommendations on shelving, merchandising, and activation.
Define frameworks for digital category execution, including search, taxonomy, and content optimization, as well as conversion and traffic drivers and personalization and digital shelf strategy.
Ensure integration of real-time analytics and test-and-learn approaches into category strategies and build capabilities that connect physical and digital shopper journeys.
- Bachelor’s Degree
- 10+ years of experience in Category Management, Insights, Sales Strategy, or CPG leadership roles
- Deep expertise in category management, shopper insights, and retail strategy
- Demonstrated success building category vision and translating insights into commercial execution
- Experience leading centralized or COE-type organizations within a matrixed structure
- Strong understanding of brick & mortar and omnichannel category dynamics
- Proven ability to influence senior stakeholders and retailer partners
- Experience leading high-performing, cross-functional teams
What can you expect from Mars?
- Work with diverse and talented Associates
- Join a purpose-driven company
- A strong focus on learning and development
- Competitive compensation and benefits package
Skills Required
- Bachelor's Degree
- 10+ years of experience in Category Management, Insights, Sales Strategy, or CPG leadership roles
- Deep expertise in category management, shopper insights, and retail strategy
- Demonstrated success building category vision and translating insights into commercial execution
- Experience leading centralized or COE-type organizations within a matrixed structure
- Strong understanding of brick & mortar and omnichannel category dynamics
- Proven ability to influence senior stakeholders and retailer partners
- Experience leading high-performing, cross-functional teams
Mars Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Mars and has not been reviewed or approved by Mars.
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Healthcare Strength — The benefits package is positioned as comprehensive, with broad medical coverage and additional protections like life insurance and short- and long-term disability. Mental health support is emphasized, including free mental health services and wellbeing programming under initiatives such as Mars Be Well.
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Parental & Family Support — Paid parental leave is highlighted as market-leading in the U.S., with an example of 18 weeks fully paid for both parents. Additional family-related leave types such as sick time for caregiving and bereavement leave are also described as part of the overall package.
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Retirement Support — Retirement offerings are described as strong, including 401(k) matching (with a 6% match cited) and pension plans in some cases. The broader package also references retirement savings options and contributions aligned to local market practice, supporting long-term financial security.
Mars Insights
What We Do
For more than a century, Mars, Incorporated has been driven by the belief that the world we want tomorrow starts with how we do business today. This idea is at the center of who we have always been as a global, family-owned business. Today, Mars is transforming, innovating and evolving in ways that affirm our commitment to making a positive impact on the world around us. Across our diverse and expanding portfolio of confectionery, food, and petcare products and services, we employ 133,000 dedicated Associates who are all moving in the same direction: forward. With $40 billion in annual sales, we produce some of the world’s best-loved brands including DOVE®, EXTRA®, M&M’s®, MILKY WAY®, SNICKERS®, TWIX®, ORBIT®, PEDIGREE®, ROYAL CANIN®, SKITTLES®, WHISKAS®, COCOAVIA®, and 5™; and take care of half of the world’s pets through our pet health services AniCura, Banfield Pet Hospitals™, BluePearl®, Linnaeus, Pet Partners™, and VCA™. We know we can only be truly successful if our partners and the communities in which we operate prosper as well. The Mars Five Principles – Quality, Responsibility, Mutuality, Efficiency and Freedom – inspire our Associates to take action every day to help create a world tomorrow in which the planet, its people and pets can thrive.
