Senior Business Development Manager📣 Job Ad

About the Role

Danone is seeking a Senior Business Development Manager to join the Evian Volvic Alpro International (EVAI) business unit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. This full-time role is central to managing distributors across allocated markets, significantly contributing to the topline and bottom-line growth of the zone and CBU. The position requires individuals who are driven, curious, and innovative, capable of developing and stretching profitability with limited resources. Successful candidates will be adept at building relationships, possess keen business acumen, and demonstrate strategic thinking to exceed targets.

Key Responsibilities

• Manage diverse sales channels, including Off-premise & Away-From-Home, with a specific focus on hyper and supermarkets, Impulse, airport, hotels, and restaurants.
• Negotiate trade terms, partner volume targets, rebates, and price changes.
• Develop business plans, identify key levers for growth, share and align with partners, and follow up with action plans.
• Anticipate risks and opportunities for the assigned channels.
• Ensure and challenge the resources needed to execute plans, including partners’ organization and investments (P&L, trade marketing investment).
• Implement trade marketing strategy and recommend market needs.
• Conduct promotional planning and forecasting.
• Closely follow up on distributor performance, KPI monitoring, market visits, and reports.
• Provide monthly reporting on performance internally and with partners.

Required Experience and Abilities

Candidates should possess approximately 6 to 8 years of relevant experience in Sales, Distributor Management, Key Account Management, or Trade Marketing, ideally within a strong multinational FMCG company (*, spirits, high-end/premium). Key abilities include being result-oriented, pragmatic, flexible, and having a quick business understanding. Strong organizational skills are essential for preparing, presenting, and following up on business plans with partners. The role requires an open-minded attitude, active listening skills, self-motivation, drive, and passion. The ability to leverage multi-cultural differences and similarities to engage people, along with the capacity to anticipate and plan ahead, is also crucial.

Essential Competencies

• Comprehensive knowledge of market and category dynamics.
• Understanding of Off-premise channels and customers (Retail, On the go & On-premise).
• Proven negotiation skills.
• Experience in trade marketing.
• Proficiency in budget planning and monitoring.
• Strong analytical skills.
• Ability to convince internal stakeholders, partners, distributors, and customers.
• Understanding of strategic vision and marketing principles.
• Effective presentation skills.

Internal and External Collaboration

This role involves extensive collaboration both internally and externally. Internal contacts include the Zone Director, hierarchical reports, and various functional teams such as Marketing, Finance, Legal, Supply Chain, Quality, Trade Marketing, Local HR, and EVI Central HR. External interactions are frequent with Distributor GMs, channel and brand managers, and customers across all channels (Retail & AFH). The role also involves engagement with other Danone CBU managers and BDMs from other FMCG companies.

About Danone EVAI

Evian Volvic Alpro International (EVAI) is the international business unit behind the worldwide success of evian, Volvic, and Alpro, bringing premium healthy hydration and plant-based nutrition to more than 90 markets across the globe. Operating in 13 locations, EVAI is powered by a culturally diverse team of over 30 nationalities. As part of Danone, EVAI combines the agility of a lean organization with the scale and purpose of a global group, offering broad opportunities for growth and leadership exposure. The unit creates, nurtures, and scales business geographies by leveraging a large distributor network, powered by a sales and marketing force that activates locally with a high level of autonomy, excellence in execution, and entrepreneurial thinking.