Brand Lead - Ice Cream

Function: Marketing (Ice Cream)

Reports to: Senior Marketing Manager Ice Cream

Location:  South Africa (La Lucia Ridge/Sandton)

Terms & Conditions: Local Conditions Apply

If you are in the Unilever Ice Cream business or are considering working for the Unilever ice Cream business, you will work for the global, leading Ice Cream player with €8bn Turn Over in 2023. The Ice Cream business is operating in a highly attractive category, as we are part of the 1 trillion snacking and refreshment industry, growing consistently at high pace. We have strong brands equities: 5 of the top 10 selling brands including Wall’s, Magnum, Ben &Jerry’s. We are investing to unlock the full growth potential of Ice Cream as a standalone entity, once we separate from Unilever, which is planned to happen by November 2025. Ice Cream has distinct characteristics from Unilever’s other operating businesses and the growth potential of Ice Cream will be better delivered under a different ownership structure.

We hope that you will want to build the new chapter of our Ice Cream history together with us.

ABOUT ICE CREAM

We spark moments of happiness for people and within the communities where we operate. As ice cream makers we are serious about happiness. With warm hearts, we create the coolest products, and we supply them to our consumers. As the largest ice cream company in the world, we have over 100 years of experience in delivering smiles, and we plan to continue this for many more years to come. If you are in the current Unilever Ice Cream business or considering working for the newly separated Ice Cream business, you will work for the Global leading Ice Cream player in a growing category where we are part of the 1 trillion snacking and refreshment industry, growing consistently at high pace.

JOB PURPOSE

An opportunity to join the dynamic, agile and competitive Ice Cream Business.   Drive the volume led growth agenda within the Ice Cream category by crafting strong brands, leading Innovations & Activity Requests and managing the P&L for your brand.

The role is end-to-end (both innovation management & deployment) for Southern Africa – high bias for action, accountability, proactivity, and drive is needed for this role.

WHAT WILL YOUR MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES BE

The key responsibilities in this role are:

• Leading Integrated Brand Plans process for your brand & portfolio (Defining, Designing and implementing the brand plans, and defining the Brand’s JTBD

• Develop & Execute Inspiring brand communications for your portfolio.

• Leadership of Innovation Projects – e.g. development of new mixes/launch into new categories etc

• Leadership of Activity Requests: e.g. introduction of new pack sizes/formats for existing mixes

• Leadership of “Lift & Shift” Projects: e.g. liaising with global teams to source and launch existing mixes mixes into SA

• Analyze, track & give recommendations for your brand/portfolio performance using the Nielsen & Data Orbis tool.

• Budget management to be vigorously controlled to ensure full delivery of project deliverable within budget

• Partnering with Customer & Channel Development & Shopper Marketing, to deliver the in- year brand plan

• Management of your brand/portfolio digital strategy and plan

• Work closely with global and local teams, as well as the artwork agency to develop packaging for the brand

• Key relationships: Customer Development, Shopper Marketing, Supply Chain, Consumer Market Insights, Research and Development, Finance Business Partners & Global and Local teams where relevant

WHAT YOU WILL NEED TO SUCCEED

Experiences & Qualifications

• Relevant Marketing Degree or equivalent.

• 2 - 3 years of relevant marketing work experience

• Able to lead projects - Strong experience with Project Management and Business case development, in a fast-paced environment

• Experience with budget controls and savings initiatives is highly advantageous

• S&OP Management for your brand/portfolio.

• Digital Marketing Capability

Skills

This role requires following key skills:

• Marketing & 6P Acumen: Partner marketing in generating brand opportunities that create the best end to end consumer experience across the 6Ps

• Business Acumen & Partnering: Work with cross functions not only marketing/CD. Shifting all briefs and learning plans from insight output to business outcome. Extracting maximum value from data and insight initiatives by building strong collaborations and influencing key business partners (internally and externally)

• Strong levels of growth mindset – a winning, competitive mindset

• Bias for actions and drive – willingness to get things done

• Consumer and customer focus – curiosity, ability to uncover relevant insights and translate these into actionable plans

• Rigour and order – ability to identify important issues and works through complex problems in an accurate and in-depth way.

• A love to experiment

• Market Research & Insight Generation: Knowing when and how to deploy research to answer key business questions and how to connect all available data in the business to transform knowledge into transformational insights for the business.

• Strategic Thinking & Problem Solving: Defining a problem, causation and solution in an objective, systematic way that showcases vulnerabilities or threats clearly while delivering opportunities that offer a competitive advantage.

• Digital Acumen: Using your digital acumen to inform marketing and customer strategies and activities, creating and landing projects that resonates with the target audience across different digital channels

Leadership

• You are energized by delivering fantastic results. You are an example to others – both your results and your resilience. You are constantly on the lookout for better ways to do things, engaging and collaborating with others along the way.

• As an individual you are the one responsible for your own wellbeing and delivering high standards of work. You must also focus on the Consumer and what they need. You are humble and have your head up, looking around to interpret evidence and data smartly, spot issues and opportunities to make things better.

• Critical SOL (Standards of Leadership) Behaviors

  • PASSION FOR HIGH PERFORMANCE: Takes personal responsibility and accountability for execution and results. Has an owner’s mindset, using data and insight to make decisions.

  • PERSONAL MASTERY: Sets high standards for themselves. Actively builds own wellbeing and resilience.

  • CONSUMER LOVE: Whatever their role, always looks for better ways to serve consumers. Invests time inside and outside to understand the needs of consumers.

  • PURPOSE & SERVICE: Has humility, understanding that leadership is service to others, inside and outside Unilever.

  • AGILITY: Explores the world around them, continually learning and developing their skills.

Unilever embraces diversity and encourages applicates from all walks of life! This means giving full and fair consideration to all applicants and continuing development of all employees regardless of age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership, and pregnancy and maternity. 

Unilever is an organisation committed to equity, inclusion and diversity to drive our business results and create a better future, every day, for our diverse employees, global consumers, partners, and communities. We believe a diverse workforce allows us to match our growth ambitions and drive inclusion across the business. At Unilever we are interested in every individual bringing their ‘Whole Self’ to work and this includes you! Thus if you require any support or access requirements, we encourage you to advise us at the time of your application so that we can support you through your recruitment journey.