Sales Manager - Los Angeles - Ingredients / Spices / Seasonings
The Opportunity
We are seeking an exceptional B2B sales professional to drive new business growth in our bulk spices, seasonings, and custom spice blends business.
This is not a traditional sales management position. We are looking for a high-performing individual producer and true new-business hunter who wants to build a significant book of business, penetrate targeted food-industry segments, and become a key driver of long-term growth.
The ideal candidate has approximately 8–10 years of B2B sales experience, preferably selling food ingredients, spices, seasonings, dry commodities, or related products to food manufacturers and co-packers.
We are particularly interested in candidates with experience and relationships within meat processing, snack foods, sauces, dressings, and adjacent food manufacturing categories.
What Success Looks Like
This person will be expected to build and execute a strategic new-business development plan capable of generating:
- Year 1: $5M in new annual sales
- Year 2: $7M in new annual sales
- Year 3: $9M in new annual sales
- Target gross margin: approximately 30%
Success will come from more than simply generating leads. We want someone who can identify attractive market segments, develop a penetration strategy, build relationships with decision-makers, uncover opportunities, navigate complex sales cycles, and close profitable business.
The role will be approximately 90% hunter, while also developing and expanding selected existing customer relationships.
The Person We're Looking For
We're looking for a sales professional who combines hunger with sophistication.
You are highly driven and competitive, but not arrogant. You know how to sell at an executive level while building genuine, long-term relationships. You are polished, personable, considerate, strategic, and highly organized.
You have strong executive function and don't need layers of management or corporate infrastructure to perform. You create your own momentum, manage your pipeline rigorously, follow through on commitments, and know where to spend your time.
Most importantly, you know how to win business.
We want someone who can bring ideas and sales capabilities—not simply execute a playbook handed to them.
Ideal Background
Must Have
- Approximately 8–10 years of successful B2B sales/business development experience
- Demonstrated ability to originate and close meaningful new business
- Strong hunter mentality and comfort building a territory or market from the ground up
- Strategic approach to market segmentation and account penetration
- Strong commercial judgment, including pricing and margin discipline
- Excellent communication, presentation, negotiation, and relationship-building skills
- Highly self-directed and comfortable operating without extensive sales infrastructure
- Ability and willingness to travel approximately 30–40%
Strongly Preferred
- Direct food-industry sales experience
- Experience selling food ingredients, spices, seasonings, dry commodities, or related products
- Relationships with food manufacturers and co-packers
- Experience within meat processing, snack foods, sauces, dressings, or similar categories
- Los Angeles/Southern California based
- Senior Sales Manager or similar high-performing individual contributor ready for the next step in their career
Environment
We are an entrepreneurial company. We move quickly, operate with a relatively flat organizational structure, and expect our leaders to take ownership.
This is not an environment with layers of sales management, large support teams, or elaborate corporate systems. The right person will see that as an opportunity rather than a limitation.
You will have significant access to senior leadership, autonomy in how you develop the market, and the opportunity to make a visible impact on the company's growth.
Compensation
- Competitive base salary, depending on experience
- Significant performance-based commission opportunity
- Uncapped earning potential
- Strong upside for exceeding sales and profitability targets
We want exceptional sales performance to be exceptionally rewarded.
The Long-Term Opportunity
We are looking for someone who wants to build something.
The right person will become a trusted commercial partner as part of our leadership team, will develop deep knowledge of our customers and markets, and will play an important role in shaping our growth strategy.
