Quality Assurance Supervisor

Department: Quality Assurance

Location: Nutlicious

Classification: Exempt

Employment: Full-Time

Shift: Full-Time, Day Shift (with flexibility for audits, incidents, sanitation, training, and production coverage)

Reports to: GM / Senior QA Manager

Functional reporting: Senior Quality Assurance Manager

Supervisory duties: As assigned

Travel: Minimal

ABOUT US:

We are the largest processor and marketer of hazelnuts in the United States. Our company has a rich history of innovation and excellence in the hazelnut industry. We are proud to say that our founders aimed to secure great financial returns for farm families by working with local growers. Our company’s commitment to the community, sustainability, and ethical practices have been a standard of our operation. We are a local, family-owned company, and we keep that family atmosphere at our core. Global reach. Zero drama and a great team!

About the Role

The QA Supervisor leads the development, implementation, maintenance, and continuous improvement of the Nutlicious SQF System. The position ensures that food-safety controls are practical, documented, verified, and consistently followed across receiving, storage, processing, packaging, sanitation, and shipping. The QA Supervisor has direct access to site management and the authority to escalate risks, place product on hold, stop affected operations, and require corrective action when food safety, legality, quality, or SQF certification may be compromised.

The QA Supervisor Responsibilities Include:

SQF System Leadership

• Serve as the designated site SQF Practitioner and primary site contact for the SQF certification body and SQF-related customer audits.
• Develop, implement, maintain, review, and improve the SQF System so it reflects current products, processes, equipment, regulatory requirements, customer requirements, and actual plant practices.
• Maintain the site certification scope and coordinate timely responses to SQF nonconformities, surveillance activity, certification changes, and required system updates.
• Report SQF System performance, significant risks, audit results, verification findings, resource needs, and improvement priorities to senior site management.
• Coordinate with the designated backup SQF Practitioner and ensure coverage, competency, and access to current records during absences.

Food Safety Plans and Preventive Controls

• Lead or actively support the site food-safety team in developing, validating, implementing, and reassessing HACCP-based food-safety plans and applicable preventive controls.
• Ensure hazard analyses address biological, chemical, physical, allergen, radiological, and economically motivated adulteration risks appropriate to Nutlicious products and processes.
• Verify that critical limits, preventive-control parameters, monitoring activities, corrective actions, validation evidence, and verification records remain scientifically and operationally sound.
• Evaluate changes to ingredients, suppliers, formulations, labels, packaging, equipment, utilities, processes, rework, sanitation, and facility layout before implementation.

Verification, Audits, and Corrective Action

• Maintain the annual verification schedule, including internal audits, GMP inspections, record reviews, traceability exercises, mock recalls, vulnerability reviews, and program effectiveness checks.
• Lead investigations of deviations, audit findings, complaints, holds, pathogen or environmental findings, foreign-material events, allergen concerns, and other food-safety or quality incidents.
• Ensure corrections and corrective and preventive actions identify defensible root causes, responsible owners, due dates, verification activities, and documented effectiveness checks.
• Trend findings, complaints, foreign material, microbiological data, sanitation results, supplier performance, holds, and recurring deviations to identify systemic risk.

Program and Record Control

• Maintain controlled procedures, specifications, forms, registers, risk assessments, plans, and records required by the SQF System.
• Ensure current documents are approved, available at points of use, protected from unintended change, and removed or clearly identified when obsolete.
• Oversee or verify key prerequisite programs, including supplier approval, allergen control, sanitation, environmental monitoring, pest prevention, calibration, preventive maintenance, foreign-material control, food defense, food fraud, traceability, product release, and crisis management.
• Confirm that product disposition and positive-release decisions are documented and that held product remains controlled until formally released, reworked, redirected, or destroyed.

Training and Food Safety Culture

• Identify role-based training needs and maintain a documented training program covering SQF, GMPs, food safety, allergen controls, sanitation, monitoring duties, and other assigned responsibilities.
• Verify employee competency through observation, questioning, record review, practical demonstration, or assessment rather than relying only on attendance signatures.
• Provide coaching and recurring communication that reinforces reporting, escalation, accountability, and food-safety culture across all shifts.
• Support supervisors in correcting behaviors and practices that do not meet documented requirements.

Regulatory, Customer, and Cross-Functional Support

• Support regulatory inspections, customer audits, complaint responses, specification reviews, and food-safety documentation requests within established timelines.
• Partner with Operations, Sanitation, Maintenance, Warehouse, Procurement, Human Resources, and corporate Quality Assurance to convert requirements into sustainable plant practices.
• Escalate unresolved food-safety risks or resource constraints directly to the General Manager and Senior Quality Assurance Manager.
• Perform other related duties consistent with the responsibilities and authority of the position.

Decision Authority

• Place ingredients, packaging, work in process, finished goods, or equipment on hold when conformity or safety is uncertain.
• Stop or suspend an affected process when a critical food-safety control fails or an imminent food-safety risk exists.
• Require containment, investigation, sanitation, inspection, testing, retraining, record correction, or other appropriate action before recommending release or restart.
• Communicate significant food-safety concerns to senior management without delay and without retaliation for good-faith escalation.
• Final product release and disposition shall follow approved site procedures and assigned approval limits.

Qualifications

• Successful completion of recognized HACCP training and demonstrated competence to develop and maintain HACCP-based food-safety plans.
• Working knowledge of the current SQF Food Manufacturing Code applicable to the site and the ability to apply its requirements to daily operations.
• Bachelor’s degree in food science, microbiology, chemistry, quality, or a related field, or an equivalent combination of education and relevant food-manufacturing experience.
• At least three years of progressive experience in food safety, quality assurance, food manufacturing, sanitation, laboratory, or regulatory compliance; SQF or other GFSI-benchmarked certification experience strongly preferred.
• Demonstrated ability to conduct audits, investigate deviations, perform root-cause analysis, manage corrective action, and interpret microbiological and process-control data.
• Strong written, verbal, organizational, and computer skills, including the ability to produce clear procedures, records, reports, training materials, and management updates.
• Ability to communicate effectively with employees at all levels and to make sound, timely decisions under pressure.

Preferred Qualifications

• SQF implementation training or current Certified SQF Practitioner credential.
• Preventive Controls Qualified Individual training, internal-auditor training, and root-cause analysis training.
• Experience with nut processing, paste or butter manufacturing, allergen controls, environmental monitoring, thermal processing, or ready-to-eat food operations.
• Bilingual English and Spanish communication skills.

Performance Expectations

• Certification readiness: SQF System remains audit-ready, current, implemented, and supported by objective evidence.
• Food-safety controls: monitoring, verification, validation, and corrective actions are timely, complete, and effective.
• CAPA management: findings are contained promptly, closed by due dates, and checked for sustained effectiveness.
• Traceability and recall: exercises meet site, regulatory, customer, and SQF requirements, with complete reconciliation and documented follow-up.
• Training competency: assigned personnel understand and correctly perform food-safety responsibilities across all shifts.
• Management communication: significant risks, trends, and resource needs are escalated promptly with practical recommendations.

WHY WE THINK YOU’LL LOVE WORKING WITH US:

• Join one of the fastest-growing companies in the hazelnut industry and find opportunities to grow in your career!
• Comprehensive medical and dental insurance plans.
• Paid time off (PTO) and paid holidays according to company policy.
• 401(k) plan with an exceptional 233% employer match on the first 6% contributed by the employee.
• We invest in your development!

WORKING CONDITIONS/PHYSICAL FACTORS:

• This position works in office, laboratory, warehouse, and food-processing environments.
• Ability to move throughout the facility, stand and walk for extended periods, use stairs where required, and inspect equipment and production areas.
• Must wear required personal protective equipment.
• Exposure to noise, dust, allergens, cleaning chemicals, temperature variation, and moving equipment.
• Occasional schedule adjustments may be required for audits, production coverage, incidents, training, sanitation activities, or urgent product decisions.
• Travel is minimal. Reasonable accommodations may be made for qualified individuals.

DISCLAIMER

This job description describes the primary responsibilities and expectations of the position. It does not create a contract of employment and may be revised as business, regulatory, customer, or certification needs change. Other duties, responsibilities, and activities may change or be assigned at any time with or without notice.

Pay: $55,000.00 - $75,000.00 per year

Benefits:

• 401(k)
• 401(k) matching
• Dental insurance
• Employee discount
• Health insurance
• Paid time off

Experience:

• Leadership: 1 year (Preferred)

Ability to Commute:

• Sandpoint, ID 83864 (Preferred)

Work Location: In person