THE ROLE
The Packhouse Supervisor reports to the Assistant Plant Manager or designated site Operations leader and provides hands-on leadership for the day-to-day operation of assigned Packhouse areas. This position supervises Packhouse Production Assistants and other assigned hourly team members and is accountable for safe, timely, efficient, and specification-compliant packing, sorting, weighing, labeling, case packing, palletizing, and finished-product staging. The Packhouse Supervisor coordinates labor, materials, equipment, food safety, quality, sanitation, inventory, and cross-functional support to achieve the Packhouse production plan and meet customer requirements.
WHAT YOU’LL DO
Packhouse Planning and Daily Execution
Lead daily Packhouse operations, including applicable packing, sorting, weighing, labeling, case packing, palletizing, finished-product staging, and Packhouse support activities.
Review the daily Packhouse production plan, pacing or timing expectations, product priorities, staffing, materials, equipment status, and operational risks before the shift begins.
Translate the production plan into clear assignments, hourly expectations, and priorities, and confirm employees understand the work, specifications, safety requirements, and expected pace.
Monitor production throughout the shift and adjust labor, sequence, line assignments, breaks, materials, or support resources to address changing volume, product availability, downtime, or customer priorities.
Ensure finished cases are produced, labeled, packed, palletized, recorded, and transferred according to the approved schedule, work instructions, and product specifications.
Maintain a visible floor presence, remove operational barriers, provide hands-on support when needed, and ensure work is completed with urgency without compromising employee safety, food safety, quality, or accuracy.
Complete an effective shift handoff that communicates production status, remaining work, staffing, equipment issues, product concerns, materials, sanitation needs, and follow-up actions.
Team Leadership and Labor Management
Supervise Packhouse Production Assistants, Leads, temporary employees, and other assigned hourly team members and ensure employees are punctual, prepared, productive, and working effectively as a team.
Develop employee schedules and daily staffing plans, manage attendance, sick time, paid time off, breaks, and coverage, and minimize unnecessary overtime while meeting the production plan.
Review and approve timekeeping information and promptly resolve or escalate missed punches, schedule discrepancies, attendance concerns, and other payroll-related exceptions.
Train and coach employees on standard work, production pace, quality expectations, food safety, sanitation, equipment use, ergonomics, and safe work practices, and verify understanding through observation and follow-up.
Maintain training and cross-training records and develop flexible team coverage for critical tasks, equipment, products, and operating conditions.
Set clear expectations, provide timely feedback, recognize strong performance, complete performance appraisals, and address performance, attendance, or conduct concerns in coordination with Operations leadership and Human Resources.
Participate in hiring, onboarding, retention, employee development, and succession planning and promote a respectful, inclusive, accountable, and high-performing work environment.
Remain calm and professional during changing conditions, communicate respectfully, address concerns consistently, and escalate employee-relations or safety issues through the appropriate channels.
Food Safety and Regulatory Compliance
Follow the facility GMPs.
Execute daily processes that enforce food safety protocols and maintain compliance.
Support the efforts of the company to maintain our food safety system and quality programs.
Responsible for ongoing involvement in key programs and verifying that critical operations (such as cleaning, allergen handling, HACCP, etc.) are always managed by qualified, trained personnel.
Ensure employees follow applicable food-safety plans, standard operating procedures, sanitation controls, personal-hygiene requirements, personal protective equipment requirements, and product-handling practices.
Ensure required production, food-safety, sanitation, cooler, temperature, traceability, verification, and other assigned records are accurate, complete, legible, and submitted on time.
Maintain required product identification, lot control, traceability, line clearance, label verification, and segregation of held, rejected, reworked, or nonconforming product.
Monitor cooler, production, and storage conditions and promptly escalate temperature deviations, contamination risks, pest activity, damaged product, foreign-material concerns, or other food-safety issues.
Partner with FSQA to complete inspections, pre-operational checks, audits, investigations, corrective actions, and employee retraining, and verify assigned actions are sustained.
Stop or hold production when an employee-safety, food-safety, quality, labeling, traceability, or regulatory concern requires immediate control and notify the appropriate site leaders.
Product Quality and Process Control
Verify product meets applicable specifications for quality, weight, count, appearance, integrity, packaging, label, date code, lot code, and case configuration.
Inspect raw product, finished product, and Packhouse processes routinely and ensure leaves or other raw materials that are damaged, contaminated, pest-affected, diseased, tip-burned, dropped, or otherwise outside specification do not enter finished packages.
Use approved scales, checks, samples, records, and verification methods to monitor process performance and finished-product consistency.
Ensure employees understand defect standards and product disposition requirements and consistently follow approved inspection, rejection, rework, hold, and escalation procedures.
Report potential pest, pathogen, raw-product, packaging, or finished-product concerns promptly to FSQA, Operations, and Growing leadership as applicable.
Monitor yield, giveaway, rework, scrap, and product damage and implement approved corrective actions to reduce waste without compromising quality or compliance.
Sanitation and Area Readiness
Maintain assigned Packhouse, cooler, storage, staging, dock, and Packhouse support areas in clean, orderly, safe, and production-ready condition.
Schedule and verify required cleaning and sanitation of floors, drains, sinks, tables, tools, equipment, furniture, coolers, storage areas, and other assigned spaces.
Ensure employees follow approved cleaning and sanitation procedures, chemical controls, tool controls, personal protective equipment requirements, and pre-operational release expectations.
Coordinate sanitation activities with production needs and provide hands-on support when required to complete cleaning safely, thoroughly, and on schedule.
Identify facility, pest-control, housekeeping, sanitation, or environmental conditions that could affect employees or products and ensure they are corrected or escalated.
Materials, Inventory, and Traceability
Monitor, request, receive, organize, and control labels, corrugated cases, packaging, product-handling supplies, sanitation supplies, and other materials required for Packhouse operations.
Use the assigned ERP, inventory, production, or reporting systems to record material usage, finished goods, waste, transfers, adjustments, counts, and other required transactions accurately and on time.
Maintain appropriate Packhouse inventory levels, identify shortages or obsolete materials early, and coordinate replenishment with Planning, Procurement, Distribution, FSQA, or other partners as applicable.
Ensure packaging and labels are stored, issued, verified, reconciled, and returned or destroyed according to applicable control and traceability requirements.
Conduct or support cycle counts and inventory investigations and resolve or escalate discrepancies that could affect production, traceability, cost, or customer service.
Equipment Readiness and Safe Operations
Ensure required production equipment, scales, printers, labelers, conveyors, tools, workstations, and material-handling equipment are available, inspected, set up, and used according to approved procedures.
Ensure employees receive required equipment and task training and follow machine guarding, ergonomics, material-handling, personal protective equipment, and other applicable employee-safety requirements.
Respond to equipment interruptions, place equipment in a safe condition, submit accurate maintenance requests, and coordinate with Maintenance to prioritize repairs and reduce avoidable downtime.
Ensure only trained and authorized employees perform adjustments, clearing, cleaning, or other equipment interactions and that lockout/tagout and hazardous-energy requirements are followed when applicable.
Document and communicate recurring equipment, process, material, or layout issues and participate in root-cause analysis and corrective-action planning.
Maintain a safe work environment, address hazards promptly, report incidents and near misses, and participate in investigations and corrective actions.
Performance Management and Cross-Functional Coordination
Track and communicate applicable production KPIs, including safety, schedule attainment, labor utilization, throughput, productivity, overtime, yield, waste, quality, downtime, sanitation completion, and inventory accuracy.
Lead daily huddles and routine performance reviews that communicate priorities, results, risks, staffing, food-safety and quality observations, and required follow-up actions.
Evaluate production methods, staffing patterns, workflows, pacing, training, and layouts and recommend improvements that increase safety, quality, service, efficiency, and employee effectiveness.
Use structured problem-solving and production data to identify root causes, implement approved corrective and preventive actions, and verify improvements are sustained.
Partner with Growing to coordinate raw-product availability and with Distribution, FSQA, Sanitation, Maintenance, Planning, Procurement, Human Resources, and other teams to coordinate product flow, labor, materials, equipment, quality, and customer requirements.
Communicate regularly with the Assistant Plant Manager or designated Operations leader regarding performance, staffing, employee issues, material constraints, downtime, food-safety or quality concerns, and significant operational risks.
Support audits, trials, new products, process changes, projects, emergency response, and business-continuity activities as assigned.
Perform duties as directed by leadership and accomplish related operational results as required.
MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS
At least three years of progressively responsible Packhouse, production, food-processing, manufacturing, warehouse, or related operations experience, including at least one year leading or supervising hourly employees.
Demonstrated experience planning labor, assigning work, managing schedules and attendance, controlling overtime, coaching employees, and holding a team accountable for daily results.
Working knowledge of applicable food-safety, GMP, sanitation, quality, traceability, labeling, temperature-control, and employee-safety requirements in a production environment.
Experience using production schedules, pacing or labor plans, standard work, performance metrics, and operational data to manage a fast-paced shift.
Experience with ERP, inventory, production-reporting, warehouse-management, or similar business systems and the ability to maintain accurate records and transactions.
Ability to inspect product, packaging, labels, and production processes and make timely decisions regarding defects, holds, rework, waste, or escalation.
Demonstrated ability to train, motivate, coach, and communicate with a diverse hourly workforce in a respectful and consistent manner.
Strong proficiency with Microsoft Office applications and the ability to use assigned scheduling, timekeeping, reporting, collaboration, and business systems.
Ability to work in Packhouse, production, warehouse, cooler, dock, storage, sanitation, and office environments and use required personal protective equipment.
Ability to stand and walk for extended periods and frequently bend, reach, push, pull, and lift or move up to 50 pounds.
Availability to work assigned shifts and provide weekend, holiday, off-shift, and emergency coverage when business needs require.
Valid authorization to work in the United States.
An associate or bachelor’s degree in operations, supply chain, food science, business, agriculture, manufacturing, or a related field is preferred.
Previous experience in fresh produce, Packhouse operations, food manufacturing, natural or organic foods, or another regulated production environment is preferred.
Food-safety, HACCP, PCQI, OSHA, Lean, Six Sigma, or similar operations or compliance training is preferred.
Bilingual English and Spanish proficiency is preferred but not required.
Knowledge, Skills And Abilities
Strong frontline leadership, labor-planning, scheduling, coaching, training, delegation, performance-management, and employee-development skills.
Ability to remain calm, organized, respectful, and decisive while managing changing priorities, production pressure, equipment interruptions, and diverse employee needs.
Strong working knowledge of Packhouse production flow, standard work, food safety, quality control, sanitation, inventory, traceability, and safe material handling.
Ability to analyze production and labor data, identify inefficiencies, solve problems, make timely decisions, and follow corrective actions through completion.
Strong attention to detail and the ability to maintain accurate schedules, time records, production records, food-safety logs, inventory transactions, and performance reporting.
Ability to balance productivity, labor cost, service, employee safety, food safety, quality, and team engagement when making operational decisions.
WHO WE ARE
Gotham Greens is on a mission to transform how and where fresh produce is grown. We are a pioneer in urban indoor agriculture and a leading fresh produce and food company. Through our national network of local high-tech farms, Gotham Greens delivers fresh, long-lasting and delicious leafy greens, herbs, salad dressings and pesto dips. all year round to retail, restaurant and foodservice customers. Founded in 2009, the company opened its first greenhouse in Brooklyn, N.Y., shortly thereafter. Today, Gotham Greens operates +1,500,000 square feet of high-tech greenhouse in 12 locations across nine U.S. states.
Our team of 600+ full time team members are hard-working, supportive and passionate about sustainable urban agriculture. We work to create an environment that is caring, fun and collaborative. Gotham Greens is proud to be an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer. We thank all applicants in advance for their interest in this position; however, only those selected for an interview will be contacted. Applicant interest only; please no external recruiters.
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