Director of Innovation, New Ventures

About the company

The company makes European-style organic infant formula manufactured end-to-end in the U.S., because we believe every parent deserves to feed their baby with confidence, without judgment and without compromise. No mystery ingredients. No shortcuts. Just clean, thoughtfully made formula that parents can trust.

But the company has never been just a formula company. When the 2022 national infant formula shortage left parents across the country unable to feed their babies, we closed our storefront to new customers rather than leave a single existing family without formula. We went to Washington. We got loud. And we opened our Heath, Ohio manufacturing facility to make sure something like that could never happen again.

That's who we are, and that's what you'd be joining.

The company for Change

Our advocacy arm, the company for Change, exists because making great formula isn't enough if the systems around parenthood are still broken. We fight for paid federal parental leave, push for legislation to prevent future formula shortages, advocate for feeding equity, and support families navigating impossible situations, including donating formula to parents impacted by breast and gynecologic cancers through the company Breasties program.

We're a company that genuinely believes becoming a parent makes you an activist. The people who work here feel that too.

As the Director of Innovation on the company’s New Ventures team reporting to the President, New Ventures, you will help build the next chapters of the company’s growth by identifying and launching new categories, products, formats, and business models that expand where and how we can serve families. You will own innovation from opportunity identification through market validation, bringing together consumer insight, product development, business strategy, and go-to-market execution to turn promising ideas into viable new businesses.

This role goes beyond getting a product to launch. You will own the go-to-market strategy, performance reporting, and test and learn agenda after launch, using real consumer behavior and business performance to determine what we iterate, scale, or stop.

Your job is to answer: Where should the company play next? What should we build? And have we proven it deserves to scale? Once an innovation has demonstrated strong consumer demand and a viable path to scale, you will lead the transition into the company’s core studio for ongoing brand management and growth.

What you will accomplish

Build the company’s New Ventures Innovation Pipeline

• Identify high potential consumer needs and translate them into opportunities for the company to enter new categories and formats.

• Build and manage a focused innovation pipeline grounded in consumer problems, category dynamics, cultural trends, competitive activity, and the company’s long term strategy.

• Develop opportunity spaces and concepts, pressure testing consumer desirability, strategic fit, feasibility, and commercial potential.

• Build business cases, financial models, pricing strategies, and success criteria to determine which opportunities the company should pursue.

• Lead consumer research, concept development, prototyping, and validation to strengthen opportunities before commercialization.

Bring New Categories & Formats to Market

• Serve as the business lead for new innovations from concept through commercialization and early market validation.

• Lead cross functional teams across R&D, Clinical, Insights, Marketing, Creative, Growth, Commercial, Operations, Finance, Regulatory, and Customer Experience.

• Define the consumer proposition, positioning, pricing, channel strategy, and business model for each new venture.

• Own the go-to-market strategy for new innovations, including audience, channel, launch sequencing, trial strategy, investment requirements, and measurement.

• Drive cross functional launch readiness and ensure the business is set up to learn quickly once an innovation reaches the market.

Own Test, Learn & In Market Validation

• Define the consumer and business hypotheses each innovation needs to prove before launch.

• Own post launch performance reporting across trial, acquisition, repeat, retention, revenue, margin, and other venture specific KPIs.

• Build and lead the test and learn roadmap, using consumer feedback and real world performance to optimize the product, proposition, pricing, channel, and GTM model.

• Translate performance into clear recommendations on what to iterate, scale, or stop.

• Capture and apply learnings across the broader New Ventures pipeline so each launch makes the company better at building the next one.

Prove New Businesses & Transition Them to the Core

• Establish clear criteria for when an innovation has demonstrated sufficient consumer demand, repeatability, and commercial viability to scale.

• Build the case for continued investment as ventures move from incubation into growth.

• Lead the transition of proven innovations into the core studio, including the business strategy, consumer learning, performance baseline, growth opportunities, and roadmap.

• Partner through the transition while shifting ongoing ownership to the core studio, allowing New Ventures to focus on building the company’s next growth opportunity.

Build the company’s Innovation Engine

• Create repeatable ways of working that allow the company to identify, build, launch, and learn from new innovations faster.

• Bring consumers into the development process early and often, from identifying unmet needs through concept development and post launch learning.

• Build strong external partnerships with suppliers, manufacturers, experts, research partners, and other collaborators that unlock new capabilities.

• Bring a portfolio mindset to New Ventures, balancing longer term category expansion with nearer term opportunities that can unlock incremental growth.

What we would like you to have

• 8-10 years of experience in product marketing, innovation, or brand management within CPG, ideally in food or nutrition; experience in infant, toddler or maternal health is a plus.

• 3+ years leading or managing cross-functional teams and direct reports

• Proven track record of bringing new products from concept through commercialization via a Stage Gate or similar innovation process

• Experience building and executing product roadmaps that balance innovation with portfolio optimization/renovation

• Experience with product positioning frameworks, competitive analysis, and category management tools (e.g., IRI/Circana, Nielsen, SPINS)

• Ability to build and present compelling ROI analyses and financial models to leadership

• Working knowledge of regulatory considerations in food/infant nutrition (FDA labeling, claims compliance) is a strong plus

• Comfortable with data visualization and presentation tools for executive-level storytelling

• Familiarity with co-manufacturing relationships and how product innovation intersects with operations and supply chain constraints

You’re inspired by our core values

• Be Radical - We are change makers, rule breakers and stigma shakers. We are unapologetically bold and use our megaphone for good.

• Nurture the Tension - Parenthood is full of healthy tension , and so is building a company. We embrace the unknowns, practice humility and are a culture of learners.

• Deliver Ounce by Ounce - Our customers have entrusted us to feed their babies. We lose sleep over the details, so they don’t have to.

• Don’t Assume - We embrace our unique perspectives, withhold judgment, and find beauty in the paths that brought us all to the company. Our strength is celebrating each other and our collective voice.

Compensation and Benefits

Compensation

Our salaries are based on paying competitively for our size and industry. For fully remote roles, we have a single salary target per role that is differentiated based on geographic location (Group A, B, or C).

• Group A (SF/Bay Area, Seattle, NYC): $220,000

• Group B (Los Angeles, Chicago, Austin, Denver, Boston, Washington DC, San Diego, Philadelphia, Portland, Sacramento): $200,000

• Group C (All Other Cities): $188,000

Benefits

• Competitive stock options

• 401k with employer match

• Employee medical, dental, and vision insurance 100% covered by the company, with options to add dependents through a subsidized pre-tax deduction

• US-based remote work model

• Flexible Time Off Policy (including Summer Fridays; half days on Fridays Memorial Day through Labor Day)

• 16 paid company holidays, plus an end of year holiday shut down

• 16 weeks of paid parental leave with the option to take an additional 8 months unpaid

• One year subscription to the company

• $75 monthly internet stipend

• Co-working space reimbursement

At the company, we are committed to building a diverse and inclusive company. We seek to create a culture where everyone can belong because we believe that people do their best work when they can show up every day as their authentic selves. We welcome people of different backgrounds, experiences, abilities, and perspectives.

The company is an equal opportunity employer. We do not make hiring or employment decisions on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability status or genetic information, in compliance with applicable federal, state and local law.

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