Operations Manager

About the company

Harry Meakin, the company founder, while learning his sales and marketing craft with L’Oreal and Diageo dreamt up the idea for MONTZI at an iconic après-ski bar in The Austrian Alps, The MooserWirt. His goal was to bottle the essence of this magnificent mountain place and take it all over the world.

MONTZI was born in the mountains in December 2016, and today sells in four European countries, you can find the brand in some of the UK’s largest and best performing hospitality groups such as Loungers plc, Mitchells & Butlers, Young’s Pubs, The Restaurant Group. Along with the world’s greatest après-ski bars like La Folie Douce and MooserWirt.

MONTZI is a range of spirits containing certified organic mountain botanicals like chamomile and edelweiss mixed with real pressed fruit.

The product is sold as a unique and better tasting drink for shots, spritzes and cocktails. And has won over ten awards with the leading food and drink institutions like IWSC and Best Taste.

Our purpose is to Save The Snow, we do this by planting three trees for every 50cl bottle sold and have so far planted 500,000 tress with The Sumatran Orangutan Society.

Current business context

The company is growing rapidly and generating profit. Now in over 1,500 bars throughout the UK. We have been able to do this with a very small team of individuals focused on production, logistics, finance, sales and marketing. We are very determined to keep this entrepreneurial culture and structure as we continue to grow.

Montoscar Board, shareholders and advisors

The Company, Montoscar Enterprises Limited, has built a truly market leading and exceptional board and shareholder group that are highly experienced and engaged in building a large and successful spirits business.

Paul Walsh (exDiageo plc CEO), Jake Bishop (Founder, Loungers plc), Cyril Camus (President, Camus La Grande Marque), Andrew Higginson (Chairman JD Sports), Diane Charlton (Founder, Once Upon A Time Marketing), Jerry Buhlmann (exAegis Group plc CEO)

What is this role

This role is about doing whatever it takes to make sure that the company is running efficiently and a catalyst for faster growth. Governance is high on the company’s agenda – our ambition is to transform our business from a start up with good intentions to become a true ESG leader.

A day in the life

• You will have freedom and responsibility, however a typical day might look something like this.
• You start the day with a call with the organisers of Cowes week’s biggest bar experience to discuss delivery of the MONTZI cocktail trailer as you and the team will be sampling and selling drinks over Cowes week 2024.
• Next you have to travel to our bottling facility in Wiltshire to fix a labelling machine, on the way you speak to three new glass suppliers to explore a new bottle mold project you are leading.
• You’ve just been told that due to a snap frost in Poland, the global supply of blackberries is completely depleted. MONTZI Blackberry has just launched in a national hospitality group so you need to find a solution to find some blackberries.
• After lunch you need to coordinate a month end stock take with our production manager to submit by end of play to our accountants. Ahead of the April board meeting which you are attending.

Core responsibilities of the role

1) Production, administration and support services

a. Organising the purchase and supply of raw materials, as well as bottling, packaging and finishing goods for the market

b. Leading the planning and investing in the right way to guarantee delivery to customers of the highest quality product at exactly the right time

c. Supporting our customers so that they feel they have excellent service from MONTZI – efficiency, relevance and quality

d. Work with CEO and suppliers on new products

2) Reduce our input costs and implement product innovation

a. Work with raw material suppliers, distillers, bottlers, and transport companies to secure cost of goods over a long period

b. Reduce spend and CO2 on transport, storage, deliveries in all markets

c. Identify the best and most cost-effective storage solutions

3) Transform our business from a start up with good intentions to a true leader in ESG

a. Work on eco-packaging solutions to get us to the trade with the minimum impact on the planet

b. Eliminate the use of any plastic in our primary and secondary packaging

c. Lead the changes we need to make to become a business that does good for planet, people and stakeholders

d. Eliminate purchasing from companies that don’t have the highest standards of Environmental, Social and Governance

4) Stock & supply management

a. Select and implement a new stock management system to control stock with precision and improve gross margin

b. Forecasting with the CEO and financial controller to ensure that we are in stock and delivering product smoothly to our customers in our markets

5) Manage IT and direct to consumer sales channels

a. Work with the brand managers to ensure that we have a growing and well managed direct to consumer operation – CRM, Amazon, Shopify, fulfillment unit.

6) Events

a. Lead the execution of all consumer and trade events, work with the brand managers to ensure that the activation is brilliantly executed. Bars turn up, stock arrives. We look the part.

Culture

We are passionate about building a brand that matters to people, our mission is to share the uplifting spirit of the mountains.

We dream big, we’re ambitious, but we are incredibly hands on, ruthlessly focused on action, results and positive outcomes.

There are no egos, we get on with being as brilliant as we can be, and are obsessed with leaving a positive impact on our customers and consumers.

Our purpose is to Save The Snow we strive to be more ecological and look after the planet

We’re devoted to people drinking better, we are making a unique product that tastes better in cocktails and softer shooters.

Our values

Passion, humility, decency, drive, entrepreneurial flair, collaboration

Ideal experience & traits

• You love to make things happen. You thrive on fixing problems yourself – be that a broken label machine or changing a tyre on the MONTZI cocktail trailer.
• You have a technical understanding and can lean on experience in food and drink manufacturing.
• You have already proven yourself in a fast paced and fast growing SME.
• Curious, driven and brave, being a major player in a small team means you will have to get on with projects that you don't often know how to do, or haven't done before. You will need some experience and confidence to get on and deliver excellent outcomes without fear.
• You can talk about systems and processes you have implemented from scratch and improved
• You are numerate and financially literate you will be able to work with financial administrator and accountants.
• You have a background in the areas of logisitics, commercial execution, supply chain.
• You are prepared to do whatever it takes to make things happen, no ego, prepared to get your hands as dirty as they need to be – you’ll load pallets of stock into a unit in the middle of a snow storm. Travel through the night to collect some labels or spend
• You are a leader not a manager, you are a doer and you truly thrive when you are making things happen – keeping the internal machine firing efficiently.
• You are happy to work independently from your colleaugues in an international organization with a very busy small team

OTHER PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS 

•  Confident in your abilities. You recognise that you don’t need to be an expert or experienced in something to make it happen. You can draw on relevant experience. You can collaborate and work with others to lead to fast & excellent outcomes.
• You have natural curiosity, you will turn over rocks to find opportunities and challenges to help the business run better. You like to explore and investigate to drive better solutions and outcomes
• You are a passionate about the product and the brand – and you are personable, others feed off and are inspired by your energy and positivity
• Entrepreneurial and independent when it comes to making things happen. You don’t wait to be motivated by others – the drive comes from within.
• Resilience to be able to take knock backs and rejection in your stride and remain positive in your focus in the face of them.
• Bright and numerate, can analyse situations and draw conclusions. Importantly you have the skills, intelligence and energy to act on your findings
• Organised and have excellent grasp of detail
• Create possibilities, can dream up ambitious and bold ideas that will positively impact the company.