Reliability and Maintenance Engineering Manager – Beverage Processing

Role Snapshot

Location: Bridgeton, New Jersey
Schedule: Day shift, Monday–Friday
Industry: Food & Beverage Manufacturing
Compensation: $120,000–$150,000 base plus annual bonus

A Day in the Life

You start your day alongside the Plant Manager reviewing line performance, OEE, and maintenance backlogs. By mid-morning, you’re coaching four frontline leaders and coordinating a team of roughly twenty-five technicians who keep high-speed bottling, canning, blending, and packaging systems running across three shifts. In the afternoon, you’re deep into a CMMS-driven PM review, aligning parts availability for an upcoming overhaul, and walking utilities—boilers, ammonia refrigeration, wastewater, and plant services—to validate safety and compliance. Before you wrap, you greenlight an equipment upgrade, confirm LOTO procedures, and align stakeholders on FDA, GMP, and OSHA requirements.

Leadership Scope

• Directly report to the Plant Manager and lead 4 direct reports plus ~25 maintenance technicians.
• Own maintenance for production equipment, plant utilities, and facility infrastructure.

What You’ll Do

• Develop, mentor, and schedule a multi-shift maintenance organization.
• Advance preventive and predictive programs to elevate reliability and OEE.
• Oversee maintenance for high-speed bottling/canning, blending, and automated packaging assets.
• Manage utilities: boilers, ammonia refrigeration systems, wastewater treatment, and core plant services.
• Troubleshoot across electrical, mechanical, hydraulic, pneumatic, PLC/controls, and industrial automation.
• Control budgets, spare parts inventory, equipment overhauls, and all CMMS workstreams.
• Drive capital projects, line upgrades, and continuous improvement initiatives (Lean, TPM).
• Ensure OSHA, FDA, GMP, and LOTO compliance and foster a strong safety culture.

What You Bring

• 7+ years leading maintenance in a manufacturing environment, with department-level ownership.
• Proven people leadership of technical teams and front-line leaders.
• Depth in electrical/mechanical systems, PLC/controls, hydraulics, and pneumatics.
• Hands-on experience supporting high-speed food or beverage production equipment.
• Knowledge of bottling, canning, and automated packaging (preferred).
• Proficiency with CMMS, preventive maintenance, and reliability improvements.
• Understanding of boilers, ammonia refrigeration, and plant utility systems.
• Working knowledge of Lean, TPM, OEE, and CI methodologies.
• Familiarity with SQF, GMP, and food manufacturing safety expectations (preferred).

Core Competencies

• Leadership and people development
• Project and change management
• Continuous improvement and problem solving
• Food & beverage manufacturing operations
• Operational metrics and KPI ownership

Eligibility

All applicants must live in the USA and have the right to work in the USA. We are unable to offer Sponsorship for this position.

Additional Information

We appreciate every application. Due to volume, we will reach out only to candidates selected to move forward.

Axion Recruitment is acting as a recruitment agency for this vacancy.