North-East Norfolk
£65,000 – £70,000 + Benefits + Potential Accommodation
Want to grow fruit… and your career? We’re working exclusively with a highly respected, long-established UK fresh produce business to recruit an experienced Growing Manager for its significant soft fruit operation in Norfolk.
This isn’t a role for someone who wants to spend their life looking at spreadsheets from an office. It’s a hands-on, commercially focused growing position with responsibility for the performance, health and development of a substantial fruit enterprise – working across crops including strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, cherries and rhubarb.
You’ll work closely with the senior farm team, taking real responsibility for crops from propagation and establishment through to harvest, while helping shape how the business grows fruit in the future. The underlying brief gives the role responsibility for achieving both production and financial targets – effectively taking responsibility for the life of the crops under your control.
The role
You’ll be involved across the whole growing operation, including crop husbandry, nutrition, pest and disease management, biological controls, environmental management and forward planning. But there’s considerably more to it than keeping the crop healthy.
You’ll lead and develop people, plan labour requirements, work with agronomists and plant raisers and play a key role in trials covering new varieties, alternative crops, growing systems, husbandry techniques and labour-saving technology. There is also genuine opportunity to contribute to future projects around protected cropping, heating, season extension and modern production techniques.
In short, they want someone who will question, trial, improve and move things forward.
About you
You’ll already have strong practical growing experience within soft fruit, fresh produce, horticulture or another intensive cropping environment. Just as importantly, you’ll be someone who enjoys being out in the crop, leading people and solving problems.
You’ll need the confidence to make decisions, challenge existing methods when appropriate and work collaboratively with farm management, agronomists, technical teams and external industry partners. Experience of managing and developing teams would be particularly valuable, as coaching, performance management and succession planning all form part of the position.
The package
The package is expected to be in the region of £65,000 – £70,000, depending on experience, with potential accommodation available for the right individual.
The wider benefits package includes 25 days’ holiday plus UK bank holidays, pension, employee benefits platform and private healthcare following the qualifying period.
Why this one?
Because good Growing Manager opportunities don’t appear every five minutes.
This is an established British fresh produce operation with significant scale, modern growing systems and the appetite to keep developing. The business behind the role has more than 70 years of history and today grows its fresh fruit in North-East Norfolk. They’re looking for someone who can bring experience, energy and ideas – and who wants the opportunity to put their fingerprints on where the growing operation goes next.
Interested?
Apply via this website or call Ian Reed on 01284 715055 quoting Ref: 6108IR
