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Hi, I'm Vaelyn — Business Manager & Brand Strategist for rapid growth CPG

Food & Beverage • Beauty & Personal Care

Career Highlights

  • ·Negotiated vendor contracts that delivered a 35% YoY category margin increase and 30% increase in vendor-funded marketing spend.
  • ·Led sales analysis, GTM strategy, and product innovation for a $200M Starbucks & Nestlé portfolio across 30 e-commerce, retail, food, club, and value channels.
  • ·Launched Starbucks Crema Collection (Feb 2025), Starbucks VIA packaging rebrand, & Seattle's Best Coffee 5-year product innovation pipeline and rebrand.
See my work Meet Vaelyn
Vaelyn Hargrave
Starbucks
Nestlé
Seattle's Best Coffee
PCA Skin
Skin Better Science
jane iredale
Beecher's Handmade Cheese
Trident Seafoods
Ferndale Market

I transform brands.

From category strategy to full-funnel product commercialization. I define, launch, and scale ideas that unlock durable, repeatable revenue.

Work With Me

About

I Build, Innovate, & Execute — A Holistic Category Approach

I'm a product and brand development specialist with deep sales and program management expertise. In addition to overseeing existing product lines and sales channels, I owned cross-functional stakeholder communication and executive-level reporting for the innovation pipeline - from concept to launch for Starbucks and Seattle's Best coffee. This work started from stage-gate management and continued through the final stages of commercialization with R&D, sales, brand, finance, demand, and supply teams.

What I Bring
  • Sales Management & P&L: Executive Presentations, Assortment & Line Reviews, Trade Spend, Cost & Term Negotiation.
  • Program Management: Stage-Gate, Milestone Tracking, Risk Mitigation, and Tradeoffs.
  • Brand & Product Development: R&D, campaign lifecycle management, Rebranding, Launch.
  • Consumer Insights: POS, Panel, and Syndicated Data (Circana/IRI, Stackline, and PowerBI).
  • Inventory Management & Supply Chain: new item forecast (NIF), demand and supply planning, allocation guidance.

Selected Work

Starbucks Crema
Collection

Oversaw cross-functional stakeholder communication for Starbucks Crema Collection - from innovation brief through final shelf placement across eCommerce, Mass Retail, Food, and Club Channels.

$21M

Portfolio

20%

Revenue Beat

Seattle's Best
Coffee

Conducted monthly and weekly executive level business reviews, assortment discussions, and line reviews utilizing data to provide actionable insights, growth opportunities, and monitor merchant supply & demand metrics across eCommerce, Food, Mass Retail, Club, and Value channels.

$130M

Total SBC Portfolio

20+

Channels

Seattle's Best Light Roast
Seattle's Best new packaging

5 Year Innovation
Pipeline

Launched Best Coffee packaging rebrand and new products like "lighthouse" and two flavor innovations "Sea Salt Toffee" and "Campfire S'mores." Implemented dashboard which reduced weekly reporting time by 35% and overstock/waste inventory by an average of 8%.

35%

Reduction in Reporting Time

8%

Overstock Reduction

Instant done
right.

Managed Starbucks Premium Instant portfolio of VIA® & Crema® Leading multi-year sales analysis, go-to-market strategy, and packaging rebrand across eCommerce, Food, Mass Retail, Club, and Value channels.

$60M

Starbucks Portfolio

15+

Channels

Starbucks VIA

7+ Years Building Brands

2026 – Present
Seattle, WA
Dr. Anne AssociationDirector, Board of Directors Program Manager, The Doctor Anne Plan
  • Overseeing B2B and B2C go-to-market sales strategy, program management, and CRM integration.
  • Developing Agentic AI for automated marketing across LinkedIn, Google Ads and social media.
  • Leading a comprehensive website redesign, rebranding and product development initiative for physical products, digital products and services.
2024 – 2025
Seattle, WA
Nestlé — Starbucks and Nestlé Coffee PartnersProgram Analyst: Sales Management & Commercialization
  • Led multi-year sales analysis, go-to-market strategy, and product innovation pipeline for a $200M CPG portfolio across eCommerce, Food, Mass Retail, Club and Value Channels.
  • Launched Starbucks Premium Instant Crema Collection (Feb 2025), Seattle's Best Coffee brand re-launch and 5-year product renovation pipeline.
  • Partnered cross-functionally with digital shelf, supply chain, finance, and merchant teams to develop, present and launch a $1.2M assortment expansion at Sam's Club.
2023 – 2024
Seattle, WA
Skin AddictionDirector of Category Management
2021 – 2023
Seattle, WA
Crowd CowCategory Manager – Sales Management & Product Development
2021
Seattle, WA
ZulilyBuyer – Category & Account Management
2017 – 2021
Seattle, WA
Nordstrom / Costco / AMS / Advantage SolutionsField Sales Management
More on LinkedIn Download Resume

Education

Bellevue, WA
Entrepreneurship and Product DevelopmentProduct Development and Innovation Bellevue College
Spokane, WA
Marketing and Design Spokane Falls Community College
Duvall, WA
Design and Branding School of Art and Innovation