Director – Consumer Insights

The Director, Consumer Insights is an enterprise insights leader responsible for translating consumer, shopper, category, brand, innovation, and go-to-market learning into clear business decisions and growth strategies. This leader serves as a strategic advisor to Marketing, Sales, Innovation and Executive Leadership, ensuring that consumer and shopper perspectives are integrated into key business choices.

This role requires strong end-to-end ownership of priority initiatives, from business-question framing and learning-plan design through execution, synthesis, recommendation, and stakeholder alignment. The Director mustoperatewith high autonomy, proactively manage risks and timelines, coach the team’s work in flight, and build trust through clear communication, analytical rigor, and reliable delivery.

The Director, Consumer Insights reports to the Vice President, Analytics, Insights, and Brand Activation and leads a team of six.

Critical Contributions:

Enterprise Insights Strategy

Generate foundational consumer, shopper, category, and industry insights that fuel category growth, brand strategy, innovation choices, and go-to-market decisions. Translate insight into clear strategic recommendations that balance consumer needs, commercial realities, financial implications, operational feasibility, and brand priorities.

End-to-End Ownership & Delivery Discipline

Own priority insights initiatives frominitialbusinessquestionthrough finalrecommendation. Ensure every project has a clear learning plan, decision to be enabled,methodology, KPIs, milestones, owners, stakeholders, and communication path before work begins. Proactively manage timelines, risks, trade-offs, and stakeholder alignment without requiring late-stage escalation.

Executive-Ready Synthesis & Decision Framing

Translate complex data, research findings, and market signals into concise, executive-ready narratives that clearly answer the business question,identifythe “so what,” clarify implications, articulate trade-offs, and recommend action. Ensure materials for senior forums are decision-ready, not data-heavyor descriptive.

Brand Building Mastery

Guidethe definition and assessment of brand equity using advanced market research tools, brand health tracking, advertising/communication testing, and consumer understanding.Identifytrends and implications that inform brand strategy, positioning, messaging, and investment choices.

Innovation & Foresight Expertise

Co-create and qualify the innovation pipeline by developing decision-oriented learning plans, defining innovation territories, assessing concepts, andidentifyingconsumer, category, and cultural shifts. Track innovation performance to improve future initiatives and explore new business models.

Go-to-Market & Shopper Insights

Create and drive go-to-market insights strategies that address shopper behavior, retail dynamics, channel performance, and consumer engagement. Leverage POS,panel,shopper, and category data to derive actionable recommendations for commercial and retail strategies.

Stakeholder Leadership & Influence

Build trusted partnerships with Marketing, Sales, Innovation, Commercial, Category, and Executive stakeholders by proactivelyaligning onbusiness questions, decision needs, research approach, timing, and success criteria. Serve as a thought partner who can challenge assumptions, influence direction, and drive alignment across functions.

People Leadership, Coaching & Capability Building

Seta clear visionand operating cadence for the Consumer Insights team. Provide active coaching through early project framing, in-flight guidance, synthesis reviews, and feedback on stakeholder-ready materials. Build team capability byidentifyingemerging insights methods, tools, and industry best practices and translating them into practical, scalable ways of working.

Critical Success Factors:

You’llbe most successful in this role if you have:

• Proven experience as a Consumer Insights leader in the CPG or consumer-led industry.

• Demonstrated ability to translate research, data, and market signals into business strategy, not just research outputs.

• Track recordof advising senior leaders and shaping decisions in brand strategy, innovation, shopper, commercial, and go-to-market forums.

• Strongexpertisein brand equity tracking, foundational consumer insights,foresight, innovation testing, shopper insights, and go-to-market strategy.

• Demonstrated ability to build decision-oriented learning plans and manage complex cross-functionalinsightsagendas.

• Proven ability to create executive-ready narratives that clarify implications, trade-offs, and recommendations.

• Strongpeopleleadership experience, including coaching senior talent, improving team output quality, and building new capabilities.

Capabilities & Required Skills:

Experience

• 10+ years of progressive experience in Consumer Insights, Market Research, Brand Strategy, Shopper Insights, or related insights leadership roles, preferably in CPG, consumer health, food/beverage, beauty, wellness, or other consumer-led categories.

• 5+ yearsof peopleleadership experience, including experience managing senior talent and/or managers.

• Experiencepresenting toand advising VP/SVP-level stakeholders in executive forums.

Consumer, Shopper & Research Expertise

• Deep understanding of consumer behavior, shopper behavior, brand equity, advertising research, innovation testing, go-to-market insights, and foundational consumer learning.

• Proficiencydesigning and conducting qualitative and quantitative research, including the ability to translate ambiguous business questions into clear learning agendas.

• Skilled inleveragingPOS, panel, brand health, shopper, category, and syndicated data to generate actionable recommendations.

Learning Plan & Delivery Excellence

• Expertisein building decision-oriented learning plans that definethe business question,decisionto be enabled, hypotheses,methodology, KPIs, stakeholders, timing, risks, and expected actions from the research.

• Ability to sequence multiple research activities into a cohesive learning journey rather than treating projects as isolated studies.

• Strong project ownership discipline, including proactive milestone management, risk identification, stakeholder communication, and follow-through.

Executive Communication & Synthesis

• Ability to develop concise, executive-ready materials with one clear message per slide, explicit implications, recommended actions, and clear connection to business decisions.

• Strong live communication skills, including the ability to answer senior leader questions directly, synthesize in real time, and avoid over-reliance on descriptive data.

Strategic and Enterprise Thinking

• Ability to integrate consumer, shopper, commercial, financial, operational, and brand considerations when making recommendations.

• Strong judgment in prioritizing work, making trade-offs, and focusing team effort on the highest-value business decisions.

People Leadership & Coaching

• Demonstrated ability toestablishteam cadence, set clear expectations, coach work in flight, provide candid feedback, and build talent capability.

• Ability to raise the quality and consistency of teamoutputsthrough standards, coaching, and accountability.

Curiosity & Capability Advancement

• Ability to stay current with emerging research methods, AI-enabled tools, industry best practices, cultural trends, and consumer behavior shifts.

• Proven ability to translate new tools or methods into practical applications that improve business decision-making and team effectiveness.

• National Target Base Pay Range: $169,000-281,000. The salary range for this position is based on national standards. For candidates in California and the New York metro, the Target Base Pay Range is$187,000-311,000, to reflect the cost of living and market conditions in those areas. 

• Actual compensation will take into account a wide range of factors that are unique to each candidate, including but not limited to geographic location, education, experience, qualifications, and job-related skills. It is not typical for an individual to be hired above the midpoint of the range for their role, and compensation decisions depend on the facts and circumstances of each case. This information is provided to applicants in accordance with state and local laws. 

• Base pay is only one component of our total rewards offerings, and we will take the full offering into consideration when presenting an offer of employment.  Our total rewards package for this position may also include an annual performance bonus, Medical, dental, and vision benefits, 401K match, and other wellness benefits.