Research & Development Director (Culinary)

Position Overview

The Director of Research & Development is a culinary innovator, strategic operator, and people leader who runs Orbital Kitchens' R&D function. The Director owns product development from concept through commercialization, delivering products that taste great, hit margin targets, and run consistently at volume across our 20+ brands and production kitchens.

Key Responsibilities

- R&D Strategy: Set the culinary R&D strategy based on company growth objectives, brand priorities, market opportunities, and operational needs. Build and prioritize an innovation pipeline that maximizes return on R&D resources.
- Product Development: Lead the development and improvement of menu items, recipes, ingredients, concepts, processes, and technologies. Set gold standards for taste, quality, consistency, scalability, and profitability.
- R&D Process & Commercialization: Own the full product lifecycle, including concept development, recipe testing, food costing, yield and shelf-life testing, stabilization, large-batch validation, tastings and approvals, launch, and post-launch review. Run concurrent projects with clear priorities, timelines, and success criteria.
- Team Leadership: Build, mentor, and lead a high-performing R&D team. Set clear expectations and accountability while fostering creativity, disciplined experimentation, collaboration, and continuous improvement.
- Scaling & Operational Feasibility: Turn concepts into repeatable, production-ready products and systems for a high-volume, multi-brand operation. Validate labor, equipment, storage, capacity, workflow, food safety, and execution complexity before launch.
- Cost & Profitability: Partner with Finance, Procurement, Supply Chain, and Operations to manage food cost, yields, waste, sourcing, and margin without compromising quality.
- Documentation & Handoff: Deliver complete recipes, specs, yields, build sheets, quality standards, and SOPs for every approved product. Lead launches with Operations, Production, Training, and Marketing, then validate results and hand off clear ownership.
- Performance & Continuous Improvement: Set R&D KPIs and use sales, margin, operational feedback, and launch results to improve the development process.

Knowledge, Skills & Experience

- 5+ years in culinary R&D, product development, or related food-industry leadership, including leading teams and taking products from concept through commercialization.
- Strong culinary foundation and knowledge of food science, recipe development, scaling, shelf life, yields, food costing, production systems, and quality control.
- High-volume, multi-unit, commissary, or manufacturing experience strongly preferred.
- Business acumen to balance culinary quality with feasibility, cost, and margin.
- Excellent project-management skills across multiple concurrent initiatives.
- Strong leadership, communication, analytical, and cross-functional collaboration skills.
- Working knowledge of food safety, sanitation, QA, and FDA, USDA, state, and local regulations, plus experience developing or supporting SOPs, SSOPs, and HACCP plans.
- Culinary or food science education and ServSafe, PCQI, or SQF certification preferred.