National Primary Logistics Manager

We are recruiting for a well-established FMCG food manufacturing business with a national manufacturing, warehousing and distribution footprint, supplying the bakery and broader food industry across South Africa and selected cross-border markets.

This is a substantial logistics role with responsibility for ensuring the OTIF supply and replenishment of temperature-sensitive product nationally , while balancing customer demand, safety stock levels, product ageing, transport capacity and cost.

The role manages product flow and replenishment across Durban, Johannesburg and Cape Town , including cold-room operations, internal fleet and 3PL transport providers.

Key areas of responsibility include:

• Managing OTIF supply and replenishment to a national customer base
• Planning and managing stock and safety stock levels against actual, budgeted and forecast sales
• Ensuring optimal stock availability while minimising product ageing and unnecessary inventory
• Managing national depot replenishment across multiple product categories
• Planning stock movement between sites, including cross-docking and bulk product movements
• Managing the Durban cold room
• Managing both an internal delivery fleet and third-party transport providers
• Driving fleet utilisation, turnaround times, route efficiencies and logistics costs
• Managing primary logistics budgets and actual performance against budget
• Working closely with Operations, Business Units and depot teams to ensure supply requirements are met
• Driving Continuous Improvement and process improvement across the logistics operation
• Ensuring compliance with Food Safety, ISO and relevant quality requirements.

Who we are looking for

You will need solid experience within a complex FMCG logistics environment , with a strong understanding of cold-chain/cold-room operations, stock management, replenishment and primary distribution .

We are particularly interested in someone who can demonstrate where they have personally taken ownership of a logistics or supply-chain problem, improved the process and delivered measurable results .

You need to be commercially aware, comfortable working with logistics costs and budgets, strong in supplier and 3PL management and able to think ahead rather than simply react to operational issues.

This role requires someone who can balance OTIF service levels, stock availability, product integrity, cost and operational efficiency while keeping a complex national supply network moving.

A relevant degree is required, together with 5+ years' people management experience within an FMCG environment . Cold-chain knowledge is important, and the position requires frequent national travel .