Wellness Operations Manager

WELLNESS OPERATIONS MANAGER

Nature’s Fare Markets is seeking a Wellness Operations Manager to provide leadership, governance, and accountability for our nutrition, wellness, and ingredient integrity standards. This role serves as the internal authority and steward for nutrition across the business, helping protect the credibility of our brand and ensuring our standards continue to evolve with nutritional science, regulatory requirements, customer expectations, and emerging food and wellness trends.

The role works cross-functionally with Category Managers, Commissary/R&D, Marketing, Operations, and store teams to ensure our nutrition and wellness positioning remains credible, differentiated, and central to our customer promise.

Role Mandate:

• Act as the company’s internal authority for nutrition, ingredient integrity, and wellness standards, ensuring standards are clear, current, evidence-based, and consistently applied across the business.
• Own and maintain product ingredient standards, including documentation, interpretation, education, and recommended updates as nutritional science, regulations, product innovation, and customer expectations evolve.
• Lead a semi-annual review and presentation to the leadership team on emerging nutritional science, regulatory developments, industry trends, customer concerns, and recommended changes to company standards.
• Provide governance and oversight to ensure products remain aligned with ingredient standards through spot audits, product reviews, clear documentation, and ongoing education for Category Managers and R&D teams.
• Partner with Commissary/R&D teams to provide nutritional consultation for prepared foods, ensuring our recipes and programs are among the best nutritional choices we can offer across departments and customer needs.
• Monitor food, health, and wellness trends and help distinguish credible developments from noise so the company can make informed decisions and respond confidently to customer questions.
• Develop and maintain an annual nutrition and wellness plan that establishes priorities, proactively advances standards and programs, and keeps the business moving forward rather than responding only when issues arise.
• Design and deliver nutrition training for Store Teams, Category Managers, Marketing, and Operations, with support from appropriate suppliers, practitioners, and subject-matter experts where relevant.
• Provide and organize nutrition and wellness talks, trend communication, and educational content for team members and customers through in-store, online, written, and community-based formats.
• Lead the development and ongoing improvement of in-store nutrition programs, customer consultation opportunities, wellness education, and related service offerings.
• Collaborate with Marketing to ensure nutrition and wellness messaging is accurate, compliant, credible, and aligned with brand standards.
• Support Operations with practical implementation of nutrition programs, training, signage, customer communication, and store-level execution.
• Lead and coordinate a team of Nutritionists and Dietitians by setting priorities, fostering communication and collaboration, allocating resources for nutrition events, supporting team development, and overseeing the creation of accurate, engaging nutritional content tying back into retail product.

• Completion of an accredited dietetics program with current registration, or eligibility for registration, with the College of Dietitians of BC is preferred.
• A degree in Human Nutrition, Nutrition Science, Dietetics, Food Science, or a related field may be considered, particularly where supported by relevant experience in nutrition standards, retail grocery, food production, product compliance, or wellness education.
• A diploma or certification in holistic nutrition, integrative nutrition, or a related whole-person wellness discipline is considered an asset.
• Experience interpreting nutritional research, ingredient standards, food regulations, health claims, and wellness trends for practical business application.
• Experience working cross-functionally with product, culinary, category management, marketing, operations, or store teams is considered an asset.

• Strong understanding of evidence-based nutrition, ingredient integrity, food trends, and the natural and organic grocery landscape.
• Knowledge of holistic and integrative nutrition approaches, with the ability to consider whole-person wellness, food quality, lifestyle factors, and practical customer needs when developing standards, education, and recommendations.
• Ability to translate scientific, regulatory, and technical information into practical standards, training, customer communication, and business recommendations.
• Sound judgment and critical thinking, with the ability to separate credible nutritional developments from unsupported claims or market noise.
• Strong leadership, influence, and collaboration skills, with the ability to work effectively across Product, Commissary/R&D, Category Management, Marketing, Operations, and store teams.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to present to leadership, educate teams, develop customer-facing content, and facilitate wellness talks or training sessions.
• Demonstrated people-leadership and coordination skills, with the ability to set clear priorities, allocate team resources, coach professional staff, and coordinate multiple educational events and content deliverables.
• Strong organizational and documentation skills, with the ability to manage standards, audits, annual plans, training materials, and multiple priorities.
• Comfortable using Microsoft Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, and related tools to document standards, prepare presentations, and manage program materials.
• Proactive, accountable, and self-directed, with the ability to identify opportunities, recommend improvements, and follow through on implementation.
• Flexible schedule required, including occasional evenings, weekends, and travel to store locations as needed.

This role will be headquartered out of our Surrey, BC head office.  Travel across BC including: Lower Mainland, Vancouver Island, Okanagan.  This role will evolve with the growth across our wellness landscape.

Put your passion into work that matters with a growing, BC-based company, committed to be a better company for our customers, our employees, and the planet. We'll surround you with a great team and a supportive learning environment where you can grow and thrive.

Nature's Fare Markets and Choices Market is an equal opportunity employer and as such we thrive to foster a workplace where individual differences are recognized, appreciated, and respected.

Apply online today!