Tesk Kitchen Associate

Location: New York City

Who We Are: Banza reimagines your favorite comfort foods, like pasta, pizza, mac & cheese, and rice, using chickpeas. Why? Because we know chickpeas aren't just delicious, they're also one of the most nutritious and sustainable foods. Yet 80% of the country isn't eating enough of them. Our mission is to inspire people to eat more chickpeas and other beans, positively impacting human health and the environment. Banza is the fastest-growing pasta brand in the country, and our products are available in over 21,000 stores nationwide. We've been named one of TIME Magazine's Best Inventions of the Year, Adweek's Best Food Brand, and are proud to have fans at Good Morning America, The New York Times, Food & Wine, Bon Appetit, and more.

Your Mission: We are looking for someone passionate about food to manage our in-office Test Kitchen, play a hands-on role in product development, and showcase our products at events. You possess a leading-edge perspective on ingredients, flavors, and trends. You will impact all things related to our Banza products by preparing for sensory analyses, creating new prototypes, conducting product testing, and supporting our tradeshow and activation efforts. We want to marry your creative, culinary mindset with our technical food scientists to help create the tastiest, most nutritious products for our consumers. You will work closely with our enthusiastic Banza team to help make our products the best they can be.

What You'll Do

• Manage the Banza Test Kitchen in our NYC office
• Manage weekly execution of in-office sensory tests by sourcing, prepping and cooking the products with precision, drafting sensory ballots, providing sensory feedback & processing results
• Rigorously test new Banza products under different conditions to identify optimization opportunities and provide findings to Product Development Managers (yes, you will test Banza waffles in many different toasters!)
• Support the Product Development & Sensory teams to ensure we're integrating a creative, culinary & consumer-centric lens into our development process
• Lead culinary planning for tradeshows, events, and in-store product demos, including product sourcing, staffing, and training. Lead culinary execution at the booth for tradeshows and events
• Execute benchtop prototyping in partnership with Product Development Managers
• Develop a blue sky prototyping program at Banza to help foster a culture of continuous innovation around chickpeas
• Keep the product inventory in the office and at off-site storage facilities in tip-top shape and process sample shipments
• Manage routine maintenance for the test kitchen's appliances to ensure ongoing compliance with fire & city code and coordinate weekly test kitchen services, like compost & laundry pick-up
• Support special projects on an as-needed basis, including sourcing products for and supporting photoshoots, developing small-scale, limited-time offer products for marketing purposes, and supporting food service sales efforts
  
  

Who You Are:

• 2-3+ years of professional experience in CPG or hospitality
• Culinary degree or commensurate industry experience
• Interested in a role that involves a healthy balance of hands-on time in the kitchen and digital work at your desk
• Strong communicator with project management experience
• Adaptable and autonomous; able to adhere to ambitious timelines and excels at both detailed, daily tasks and zooming out to big-picture priorities
• Organized and efficient, with a chef's approach to kitchen management
• Confident, passionate, and comfortable representing Banza at external trade shows & events
• Ability to be in the NYC office 3 days a week
• Ability to travel 10%+
• Ability to drive and valid driver's license required, for occasional travel during trade shows/events required
• Must love Banza!
  
  

To Apply: Write a cover letter describing why you want to join Banza and why you would be an excellent fit for this role (yes, we actually read every cover letter!) and then apply directly to this posting. If you have any questions, please email jobs@eatbanza.com.

We're aware of the research showing that historically underrepresented groups are less likely to apply for a job if they don't believe that they meet all of the criteria. Do you hesitate to submit an application because you believe you need to check every box? Please apply anyway with a thoughtful cover letter! We would love to hear from you to discuss how you can help us build a great team at Banza.

Our Commitment: Banza is committed to a diverse and inclusive workforce. To achieve our mission of inspiring people to eat more chickpeas and other beans, we greatly benefit from a range of perspectives, which comes from diversity of all types, at all levels of the organization. Achieving true diversity and inclusion is the right thing to do and the smart thing for our business. So we strongly encourage women, veterans, people with all abilities, people of color, and gender nonconforming candidates to apply.

Banza is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of an individual's sex, age, race, color, creed, national origin, alienage, religion, marital status, pregnancy, sexual orientation or affectional preference, gender identity and expression, disability, genetic trait or predisposition, carrier status, citizenship, veteran or military status and other personal characteristics protected by law. All applications will receive consideration for employment without regard to legally protected characteristics. Banza will consider qualified applicants including those with criminal histories consistent with legal requirements.

Compensation, Perks, and Benefits

Our salary ranges are based on verified market data and our philosophy of paying competitively for our size and industry. In addition to base salary, full-time team members receive equity in the company, medical, dental, and vision insurance through United Healthcare, free Banza products, and monthly stipends for fitness, internet, and cell phones.

Individual pay rate decisions are based on a number of factors, including qualifications for the role, experience level, skillset, and balancing internal equity relative to peers at the company. We expect the majority of the candidates who are offered roles at our company to fall healthily throughout the range based on these factors. The salary band for this role is $65,000 - $80,000. The range is for the expectations as laid out in the job description, however, we are often open to a wide variety of profiles, and recognize that the person we hire may be less experienced (or more senior) than this job description as posted. If that ends up being the case, the updated salary range will be communicated to you as a candidate.