Quality Manager

The Role Every avocado that reaches a customer reflects our quality and food safety standards. As our Food Safety & Quality Assurance Manager, you’ll own the systems behind that promise. You’ll partner with plant leadership to keep our facilities audit-ready, turn customer feedback into lasting improvements, and build a team that raises the bar. A core focus of the role is getting to the root cause: investigating issues thoroughly, spotting trends early, and making sure corrective and preventive actions stick. What You’ll Do

• Customer focus: Manage customer and consumer complaint response, tracking, and prevention, and use what you learn to prevent repeat issues.
• Root cause and CAPA: Lead root cause investigations for quality, food safety, and customer issues using structured tools such as 5 Whys and fishbone analysis, and drive corrective and preventive actions (CAPA) to closure with verified effectiveness.
• Trend analysis: Analyze quality, audit, complaint, and supplier data to identify trends and emerging risks early, and report findings and recommendations to leadership.
• Quality system: Lead the plant Quality System and team for US locations (Murrieta, CA, Dallas, Texas, and Swedesboro, New Jersey), working with plant management to maintain and improve it.
• Food safety plans: Own the HACCP and Preventive Controls plans, lead the facility Food Safety Team, and ensure compliance with FSMA and all regulatory requirements.
• Regulatory compliance: Anticipate and respond to federal, state, county, and city requirements, including USDA and FDA, and lead corrective and preventive actions, in partnership with the Senior Manager of Quality, who is based in Michoacan, Mexico.
• Audits: Lead third-party audits and internal audit programs, and track corrective actions to completion.
• Product conformance: Make collaborative decisions on raw, in-process, and finished product, and support product specifications and new product development.
• Recalls and sampling: Coordinate recall efforts as directed by Corporate Food Safety and Quality, and manage the environmental and regulatory sampling program.
• Suppliers: Build and maintain the service supplier compliance and performance tracking program.
• Continuous improvement: Set ambitious goals, track business metrics, and use what investigations and trends reveal to improve processes.
• People: Hire, train, coach, and develop your team of site based Quality Supervisors, Inspectors and Sanitation team members.

What You Bring

• College degree in food science, food technology, microbiology, or a related field.
• 5+ years in a progressively responsible QA supervisory or management role, including experience in a food manufacturing environment.
• HACCP certification and plan development experience.
• Proven experience leading root cause investigations, trend analysis, and CAPA programs.
• Experience working with state and local regulators. Ready-to-eat and USDA-inspected operations experience strongly preferred.
• PrimusGFS and Famous experience a plus. PCQI certification a plus.
• Bilingual in English and Spanish strongly preferred.
• Strong statistical and analytical skills, including spreadsheets and statistical tools, plus proficiency in Microsoft Word, Excel, and Outlook.
• A customer-first mindset, with the ability to thrive in a fast-paced, dynamic environment and stay professional and diplomatic under pressure.

What We Offer

• 401(k): Safe Harbor plan with a 100% match on the first 3% you contribute and 50% on the next 2%, fully vested.
• Medical, dental, and vision: Medical plan choices that include PPO options, with West Pak paying 85% of employee premiums on the standard PPO.
• Life and disability: Company-paid Basic Life, AD&D, and short- and long-term disability.
• Other benefits: Flexible Spending Account, paid time off, and voluntary life, pet, and legal insurance.

West Pak Avocado is an equal opportunity employer.

Day Shift Monday through Friday, start time 7:00am with flexibility for O/T as needed and availability to respond to calls and emails throughout the weekend.