Supply Chain Operations Lead
Company
Soul Water — premium mineral-water / beverage brand
Engagement
0.75 FTE (24 – 34 hrs/week), flexible, remote
Start
Q3 2026
Reports to
Operating Partner
Works with
Commercial, Sales Support & Order Desk, Finance & Control, and external production, warehousing and logistics partners
About Soul Water
Soul Water is a premium mineral-water brand sold across the Netherlands, Spain, France, Belgium and selected export markets, through hospitality & venues, B2B and retail, and a growing digital channel.
We run deliberately lean: a small, senior core team that owns strategy, brand and relationships, supported by an automated back office and a flexible layer of specialist external partners. Our guiding principle is automate the desk, outsource the hands, keep the brain, internally we orchestrate, we don’t do everything in-house.
We’re scaling and 10Xing our company until 2030. As volumes grow across multiple countries and channels, our supply chain becomes a core driver of both service and margin. This role owns it.
The role
You are the single accountable owner of Soul Water’s supply chain. From production through to the customer’s door.
We don’t own factories or trucks; we run an asset-light model built on external production, warehousing, fulfilment and logistics partners. Your job is to orchestrate that network so it is reliable, cost-efficient and ready to scale: getting the right product, in the right place, at the right quality and cost, while building the planning and systems that let volume grow without the headcount growing with it.
What you’ll own
Production & co-packing. Own the relationships with our European production partners on: forecasting, capacity planning, supply agreements, cost and continuity of supply.
Procurement. Manage sourcing and supplier terms; protect against single-source risk as we scale.
Warehousing & distribution. Run our two central warehouses (Spain and the Netherlands) and 3PL partners, Transport Coordination, Stock Policy, Service Levels, Cost-per-Order. Distribution reach is serving NL, BE, FR, ES, the Balearics, export markets and digital fulfilment. As of 2027 we will expand our market reach within the European teritory.
Demand & supply planning. Own a light-weight S&OP rhythm: connect commercial forecasts to production and stock, so we avoid both stockouts and dead stock.
Quality & compliance. Be the accountable owner for product quality and multi-country EU compliance (food safety, specifications, labelling), coordinating outsourced regulatory support where needed.
Cost & margin. Own the COGS and logistics cost lines; drive unit-cost efficiency and service improvements as volume grows.
Scalable, automated processes. Build the supply chain operating model: systems, data and ways of working that scales toward €10M without a proportional rise in manual work.
Targets you’ll be measured on.
Reliable supply and on-time, in-full delivery across all markets and channels as volumes scale.
• COGS and logistics cost per unit trending down as volume grows.
• Healthy stock levels: no avoidable stockouts, no excess or obsolete inventory.
• Robust, compliant quality across every market, with no regulatory surprises.
• Resilience: no critical single points of failure in production, warehousing or transport.
Who you’ll work with
- Commercial / Sales — turning their forecasts and launches into a deliverable supply plan.
- Sales Support & Order Desk — connecting orders to fulfilment through an increasingly automated flow.
- Finance & Control — on COGS, logistics cost, stock value and margin.
- External partners — the production plants, warehouses, 3PLs and regulatory specialists you’ll direct day to day.
What we’re looking for
• 5+ years in supply chain or operations in FMCG, beverage or food and ideally in a fast-growing, asset-light or co-packed business.
• Hands-on experience managing contract manufacturing / co-packers and 3PL / warehousing partners as an effective client.
• Multi-country European distribution experience; comfortable across borders, languages and logistics setups.
• Strong in demand & supply planning, procurement and inventory management, with a real grip on cost and margin.
• Working knowledge of food/beverage quality and EU regulatory compliance (HACCP/food-safety principles, labelling).
• Data- and systems-literate; able to build lean, scalable processes rather than rely on manual effort.
• Self-sufficient and senior enough to own the function end to end with little oversight.
• Working proficiency in Dutch; English and/or Spanish a strong plus given our sites and markets.
Nice to have
• Experience scaling a beverage or liquid-product supply chain through a steep growth curve.
• Exposure to e-commerce / DTC fulfilment alongside retail and on-trade distribution.
• Experience standing up supply chain systems or automation from a lean base.
• Experience with B-Corp and ISO processes.
How you work
You fit Soul Water if you’re an orchestrator, not an executor and as someone who builds and steers a partner network and the systems around it, rather than doing everything in-house.
You’re commercial about cost and margin, rigorous about quality and continuity, and energised by building a supply chain that scales. You own outcomes without being managed closely, and you’re comfortable making the function robust enough that it never depends on a single person.
Practical details
• Scope: part-time (0.75 FTE); single accountable owner of Supply Chain Operations.
• Start: Q3 2026
• Location: based in The Netherlands, flexible / hybrid. With presence as needed at our warehouse and production touchpoints (NL, ES, AUT, DE).