REGIONAL SALES DIRECTOR

Responsibilities

Regional Sales Leadership and Performance

• Develop and execute regional sales strategies to achieve or exceed annual volume, revenue, distribution, and execution goals.
• Inspire and lead the regional sales organization toward achievement of weekly, monthly, trimester, and annual company goals.
• Establish clear performance expectations and hold the team accountable to company KPIs, priorities, and commitments.
• Analyze sales trends, depletion performance, distribution, velocity, and market conditions to identify opportunities and performance gaps.
• Develop corrective action plans when markets, distributors, customers, or team members are not achieving expectations.
• Identify emerging market and consumer trends and develop strategies to capitalize on future growth opportunities.
• Participate in pilot programs, strategic initiatives, and other company priorities as needed.

Distributor and Retail Relationship Management

• Build and maintain strong relationships with distributor principals, senior management, sales leadership, and field sales teams.
• Establish consistent communication and call frequency with assigned distributors to drive sales, distribution, execution, and share of mind.
• Manage distributor planning, forecasting, inventory, pricing, execution, and performance reviews.
• Conduct documented Top-to-Top business reviews with the region's Tier A wholesalers.
• Conduct a minimum of one planning meeting per quarter with the region's top 10 distributors.
• Conduct a minimum of two formal business reviews annually with priority distributors, including an Annual Business Plan meeting and Mid-Year Business Review.
• Prioritize distributor engagement using an 80/20 approach, concentrating resources against distributors representing the majority of regional volume and opportunity.
• Maintain regular communication with distributor management through calls, presentations, market visits, business reviews, and other appropriate engagement.
• Monitor distributor inventory levels and proactively address out-of-stocks, excess inventory, forecasting issues, and supply concerns.

Sales Execution

• Drive execution of national and regional promotions, pricing programs, innovation launches, displays, and brand initiatives.
• Identify new market, retailer, channel, and account opportunities across chain, independent, convenience, liquor, grocery, and on-premise channels.
• Conduct regular market visits to evaluate retail execution, competitive activity, and business opportunities.
• Ensure market activity is focused on priority accounts, execution opportunities, distribution growth, and business development.
• Seek out appropriate marketing, sampling, promotional, and special-event opportunities that support regional sales objectives.

Team Leadership and Development

• Lead, coach, and develop Area Managers, Territory Managers, and other regional sales personnel.
• Provide ongoing coaching, training, feedback, and development for direct reports.
• Conduct formal market ride-withs with each direct report at least once per trimester.
• For Regional Sales Directors with five or more direct reports, complete a minimum of two formal ride-withs per employee annually.
• Use ride-withs to coach selling skills, distributor management, retail execution, business planning, and leadership development.
• Conduct regular regional team meetings to communicate priorities, review performance, address gaps, and align on upcoming initiatives.
• Develop future leaders and create a culture of accountability, collaboration, urgency, and continuous improvement.

Market Planning, Analytics, and Opportunity Identification

• Lead annual regional business plan development, presentation, and execution.
• Utilize syndicated data, distributor depletion reporting, CRM tools, and internal scorecards to evaluate performance and guide decision-making.
• Maintain proficiency with platforms such as VIP, Karma, or similar distributor reporting and CRM systems.
• Conduct regular forecasting reviews and identify risks and opportunities versus company targets.
• Develop and manage regional pricing strategies, including price increase recommendations, distributor sell-in, and cents-per-case analysis.
• Evaluate distributor profitability, retailer pricing, promotional effectiveness, and competitive activity.
• Provide senior management with clear assessments of regional performance, opportunities, risks, and recommended actions.
• Provide market intelligence and retailer/distributor feedback to help guide company strategy, innovation, pricing, programming, and resource allocation.
• Manage regional budgets and expenses within company guidelines.
• Hold regional team members accountable for responsible expense management.
• Manage and evaluate regional investments, incentives, programming, travel, entertainment, and other sales expenditures.
• Partner with Finance and Sales Strategy to evaluate the financial return of regional programs and investments.
• Partner closely with Marketing and Trade Marketing to develop and execute programs that increase awareness, trial, distribution, and sales.
• Collaborate with Finance, Operations, Supply Chain, Sales Strategy, and senior leadership to support regional business objectives.
• Ensure regional sales strategies and market activity are aligned with broader Happy Dad company priorities.

CRM, Reporting, and Accountability

• Deliver monthly reviews of assigned distributor performance to Happy Dad senior management and distributor leadership as appropriate.
• Track regional sales performance, execution gaps, commitments, opportunities, and follow-ups through required company platforms.
• Maintain clear communication with senior management regarding significant regional opportunities, risks, and performance developments.

Requirements

• 10+ years of sales experience within the beverage alcohol industry, preferably across multiple markets and distributor networks.
• Minimum 3–5 years of sales leadership and people-management experience preferred.
• Advanced understanding of the U.S. three-tier beverage alcohol system.
• Strong forecasting, financial management, pricing, and business-planning capabilities.
• Ability to confidently present to distributor ownership, senior management, retailers, and internal leadership.
• Strategic thinker with a strong bias toward execution and accountability.
• Hands-on leadership style with the ability to motivate, coach, and develop teams.
• Proficiency with Google Workspace, Excel, PowerPoint, Word, Outlook, and related business tools.
• Ability to travel up to 40% of the time.

Can reside in the following states

New Jersey / New York / Philadelphia

Key Responsibilities

Financial Management

Cross-Functional Collaboration

• Use company CRM and reporting platforms to document required market activity, account visits, business reviews, commitments, and follow-up actions.
• Complete a minimum of 50 unique account visits per quarter and 200 unique account visits annually.
• Account Visit Expectations

Quarterly Goal

50 unique account visits

Annual Goal

200 unique account visits

• Account visits must be documented within the company CRM platform.
• Visits should focus on priority customers, execution opportunities, competitive activity, key retailer relationships, and strategic market development.

Requirements

• Demonstrated track record of driving revenue, volume, distribution, and market execution.
• Strong experience managing distributor relationships and holding distributor partners accountable to business objectives.
• Experience working across multiple channels, including chain, independent, convenience, liquor, grocery, and on-premise.
• Strong analytical capabilities with experience utilizing syndicated and distributor sales data.
• Familiarity with Circana/IRI, VIP, Karma, CRM platforms, or comparable sales and distributor reporting systems.
• Excellent leadership, communication, presentation, negotiation, and relationship-building skills.
• Must live within or near the assigned primary sales territory.
• Must be eligible to work in the United States.
• Valid driver's license and acceptable driving record.
• Bachelor's Degree preferred.
• Passion for the beverage alcohol industry, brand building, and the Happy Dad brand.