Why Hershey:
At The Hershey Company, our culture is rooted in purpose and inspired by Milton Hershey’s enduring vision that business should create opportunity for others. Through our commitment to corporate philanthropy, we create positive impact by supporting communities, helping children thrive, and operating as a business for good. This includes our deep and long standing partnership with Milton Hershey School, where we invest in education, workforce readiness, and hands on engagement to help students succeed beyond the classroom. Supported by strategic grantmaking, product donations, cross brand collaboration, and strong employee volunteerism, Hershey offers a place to work where making a difference—locally and globally—is part of how we do business every day.
The Hershey Company is an industry-leading snacks company known for making more moments of goodness through its iconic brands. With a strong portfolio across chocolate, confectionery, and salty snacks, Hershey delights consumers every day. Our beloved brands include Hershey’s, Reese’s, KitKat®, Dots Pretzels, Lesser Evil, Jolly Rancher, Twizzlers, Ice Breakers, and more.
At Hershey, we are committed to making a meaningful difference in the communities where we live, work, and do business. This commitment originated with our founder, Milton Hershey, and continues to shape who we are today.
Guided by our employee value proposition, **Lead Today. Create Tomorrow, **we empower our people to drive impact now while shaping what comes next. Our One Hershey mindset brings teams together across functions, geographies, and businesses, enabling us to operate with speed, collaboration, and shared purpose.
The Hershey Company is proud to be recognized as a top employer in the United States, reflecting our commitment to our people, culture, and purpose.
The Senior Engineer, Salty R&D will support end-to-end process development, scale-up, and commercialization across Hershey’s growing salty and baked snack platforms, including popcorn, extruded snacks, pretzels, fried snacks, and baked cracker/snack systems.
In this role, you will bring strong engineering expertise to help develop robust processes that deliver consistent product quality, improve efficiency, enable innovation, and expand capabilities across our manufacturing network. You will partner closely with Product Development, Engineering, Operations, Quality, and Manufacturing teams to scale new snack technologies from pilot to full production.
This role reports to the Manager, Process Development and is based at the Hershey Technical Center in Hershey, PA.
- Provide process development expertise across salty and baked snack platforms, including thermal processing, extrusion, frying, baking, drying, seasoning application, oil systems, airflow control, and overall process performance.
- Design and support process validation experiments to optimize throughput, yield, texture, color, moisture, energy use, and product consistency.
- Lead pilot-scale and full-scale trials for new processes, equipment modifications, and technology introductions.
- Partner with Operations and Engineering on equipment commissioning, FAT/SAT, and process validation.
- Troubleshoot complex manufacturing challenges related to texture variability, oil quality, seasoning adhesion, expansion, airflow, heat distribution, and other process factors.
- Develop process guides, operating windows, critical control parameters, technical documentation, scale-up recommendations, and engineering SOPs.
- Serve as an engineering lead on cross-functional innovation teams, helping connect formulation, process design, equipment capability, and manufacturing execution.
- Contribute to long-term platform capability roadmaps and continuous improvement opportunities in areas such as frying technology, extrusion, baking systems, airflow, seasoning application, productivity, and energy reduction.
- BS degree in Chemical Engineering, Food Engineering, Chemistry, or related engineering field with 6-8 years’ experience, MS or PhD in Food Engineering or related field with 2-4 years’ experience. Intern and prior research project work will be considered; Salty Snacks process development experience is preferred.
- Experience with two or more of the following strongly preferred: popcorn, extrusion, frying, pretzels, baked snacks.
- Demonstrated success scaling new products or processes into manufacturing.
- Experience with DOE, statistical tools, and data-driven root cause analysis (e.g., Six Sigma).
- Experience leading plant trials and troubleshooting manufacturing issues.
Additional Requirements
- Ability to work in plant, pilot, and lab environments.
- Ability to travel 20-50% depending on project and plant support needs.
- Must be capable of lifting approximately 40 lbs. during pilot-scale and equipment work.
- Must be comfortable working around heat, oil systems, noise, and industrial equipment.
At Hershey, we offer competitive pay and a comprehensive total rewards package designed to support your wellbeing, financial security, and life outside of work.
- Health & Wellbeing: Medical, dental, and vision coverage, plus wellness programs that support your physical and mental health
- Financial Security: Competitive pay, annual incentive opportunities, and a 401(k) with company match
- Time Off & Flexibility: Paid time off, company holidays, and flexible ways of working where applicable
- Growth & Development: Career development programs, learning opportunities, and internal mobility
Benefits may vary based on role, location, and eligibility.
The Hershey Company is an Equal Opportunity Employer. The policy of The Hershey Company is to extend opportunities to qualified applicants and employees on an equal basis regardless of an individual's race, color, gender, age, national origin, religion, citizenship status, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, transgender status, physical or mental disability, protected veteran status, genetic information, pregnancy, or any other categories protected by applicable federal, state or local laws.
The Hershey Company is an Equal Opportunity Employer - Minority/Female/Disabled/Protected Veterans.
You may request a reasonable accommodation if you are unable or limited in your ability to use or access our online application process as a result of a disability.
You can request an accommodation via phone or email.
To request an accommodation via phone, please call +1 877-804-1794 and leave a voicemail with your contact information. You may also email a request for accommodation to [email protected]. Please be sure to include “Accommodation Needed” in the subject line. This will ensure that your email is routed to the appropriate contact who will handle your request.
