At Valeo Foods UK we bring together a family of much-loved UK food brands supported by the scale and ambition of a global investment partner. From Kettle’s bold crunch to Rowse’s natural sweetness, through to Matthew Walker and Barratt Sweets, our portfolio blends heritage, craft and category-leading innovation.
Alongside our branded portfolio, we are also one of the UK’s largest suppliers of private label products, partnering with major retailers to deliver quality and category expertise that meets the needs of millions of households every week.
As a business, we’re on a journey of transformation. We’re strengthening our operations, driving quality and investing in our people. It’s an exciting, fast-moving environment where heritage meets new thinking, and where every colleague contributes to shaping the future of food across the UK.
Join us and play your part in building the next chapter of some of Britain’s most loved brands.
Job DescriptionAs we continue to grow (including across Central & Eastern Europe and new acquisitions), we’re looking for a Head of R&D – Sweets to lead, inspire and elevate our innovation and delivery across the portfolio.
This is a high-impact, highly visible leadership role, one that blends strategy, delivery, and people leadership. If you thrive in a fast-paced environment and love turning ideas into products that consumers love, you’ll feel right at home here.
This is a broad, high-impact leadership role across all confectionery R&D, covering both Valeo brands and retailer brands, in the UK and CEE.
At its heart, your role is simple: set the standard, drive delivery, lead innovation, and build a brilliant team.
In practice, that means you’ll:
- Set the tone for R&D – bringing the right balance of creativity, rigour and discipline
- Keep the pipeline moving – ensuring innovation, renovation and productivity projects land on time and with pace
- Own the innovation agenda – shaping the sweets strategy and weaving ESG into everything we do
- Lead and grow the team – building capability, coaching talent, and creating a high-performing environment
Alongside that, you’ll:
- Work closely with Brand, Marketing and Commercial teams to bring great ideas to life
- Partner with customers and stakeholders to stay ahead of changing needs
- Strengthen how we deliver projects through clear, structured governance
- Make sure new launches work not just on paper, but in our factories
- Stay plugged into the outside world, spotting trends, technologies and new ideas worth exploring
We’re looking for someone who combines technical depth, commercial thinking and inspiring leadership.
You’ll likely bring:
- A degree in Food Science or a related discipline
- Strong experience across the full R&D lifecycle, from insight to delivery and measurement
- A proven track record of leading teams and delivering tangible business results
- Experience working cross-functionally and influencing senior stakeholders
- A background in food or confectionery R&D, ideally within a fast-paced environment
And just as importantly, you are:
- A leader who can align, motivate and challenge
- Commercially minded, able to connect data with real-world business impact
- Comfortable operating at both strategic and hands-on levels
- A natural collaborator who can say what needs to be said—and bring people with you
- Someone who thrives on change, pace and continuous improvement
- Passionate about building teams that are better tomorrow than today
This is a chance to step into a true leadership role with breadth, visibility and influence—where you’ll shape not just products, but how we work as a business.
You’ll join a company that’s growing, evolving, and full of opportunity, with the backing to bring big ideas to life.
Skills Required
- Degree in Food Science or related discipline
- Strong experience across the full R&D lifecycle (insight to delivery and measurement)
- Proven track record of leading teams and delivering tangible business results
- Experience working cross-functionally and influencing senior stakeholders
- Background in food or confectionery R&D
- Experience in fast-paced consumer goods environment (ideally confectionery)
- Leadership ability to align, motivate and challenge teams
- Commercially minded, able to connect data with business impact
- Comfortable operating at both strategic and hands-on levels
- Strong collaboration and stakeholder management skills
- Thrives on change, pace and continuous improvement
- Passionate about building and developing high-performing teams
What We Do
We are a leading producer and innovator of high quality, category-defining branded food products that have a proud history that dates back to 1845. At Valeo Foods, we are passionate about food and our portfolio of over 20 iconic food brands, which includes Jacobs, Batchelors, Kettle, Rowse Honey, Balconi, Schluckwerder, are tried and trusted by consumers across Ireland, UK and Europe for their quality, wholesomeness, nutrition and fun. We are a diverse business that combines food production, brand development and innovation, distribution and sales. We are Ireland’s largest ambient food supplier to the grocery trade, a major supplier to the food service market through Valeo Professional, and an increasingly prominent supplier to the UK market and a range of European Markets now. We are focused on the continued development of our excellent portfolio of category defining food brands as we look to expand our footprint across Ireland, UK, Europe and beyond with our latest acquisition in North America. We are committed to delivering quality food products through continued innovation and excellence in manufacturing. This commitment ensures that our brands retain a market leading position in each of their respective categories. We continue to recruit people with the best skills and expertise across a range of areas including manufacturing, food science, research and development, nutrition, distribution, sales, operations, marketing, human resources and finance, and aspire to be a best in class employer, focused on developing and empowering our people.
