Job Title: Butchery Production Manager
Location: Redditch (Oakland International, near Atwell Farm Park)
Hours: Full-Time, 42.5 Hours per Week, Monday to Friday
Salary: £30,500 - £35,000 per annum (Dependent on Experience)
Monday to Friday Only - No Weekends, No Late Nights, No Split Shifts
If you are a skilled butcher or production lead looking for consistent daytime hours, a hands-on role with genuine variety, and the chance to be central to a growing premium food business, this role at Eric Lyons was made for you.
About Eric Lyons
Eric Lyons is an award-winning, family-run butcher and fine food retailer with over 120 years of heritage and an uncompromising passion for exceptional quality. Alongside our retail stores, we operate a dedicated production facility at Oakland International in Redditch, near Atwell Farm Park, where our team produces the premium butchery and food products that supply our growing network of shops every single day.
Each of our stores operates a full butchery counter. The production facility is the engine behind all of them. As our operation continues to expand, we are looking for an experienced and motivated Butchery Production Manager to lead our butchery output, oversee pre-pack production, and ensure everything that reaches our store counters and grab-and-go fridges is produced to the highest standard.
The Role
Based at our Redditch production facility, you will work closely alongside Mike, our Operations Manager, Dan Lyons, our Operations Director, our team of three to four Head Chefs, and our Logistics Manager. You will also work hand in hand with our Delivery Driver, coordinating what is packed, labelled, and ready to load each morning.
You will be responsible for leading daily butchery production, managing a small team of agency staff on the floor, producing the full range of grab-and-go and pre-pack butchery products, and ensuring whole boxes and primal cuts are correctly prepared and dispatched to our stores. There will be some carcass breakdown involved, but the majority of your work will be production-focused, taking in cut and portioned products from suppliers and turning them into finished, retail-ready items. Alongside this you will prepare the cuts needed for the chefs (pie meats, sausagemeat, pork pie filling...)
This is a hands-on leadership role. You will set the quality standard, work alongside your team every day, and take real ownership of what goes out the door.
What Your Day Looks Like
Goods In and Quality Checks
Your morning starts with receiving and checking incoming deliveries of cut and portioned meat products. You will verify weights, quality, and specifications against purchase orders, ensuring everything that enters production meets the Eric Lyons standard. Whole chickens, strip loins, legs of lamb, pork cuts, and other pre-ordered product lines all come through your hands first.
Butchery Pre-Pack and Grab-and-Go Production
The core of your day is production. You and your agency team will be producing the full range of pre-packed butchery products destined for the grab-and-go fridges across our stores. That includes:
- Beef burgers
- Lamb koftas
- Lamb skewers
- Piri Piri spatchcock chickens
- Portioned steaks and other retail-ready cuts
Everything is portioned, weighed, labelled, and packaged to specification here at the facility before it ever reaches a store shelf. Consistency, accuracy, and presentation matter enormously. You will ensure the team hits the right weights, the right pack counts, and the right standard on every product, every day.
Whole Box and Primal Preparation for Store Counters
Alongside the pre-pack range, you will prepare and dispatch whole product boxes for our store butchery counters. Strip loins, legs of lamb, whole box chickens, and similar items go out in trade-ready condition, ready for the store butchers to work with on the counter. Accurate labelling, correct temperatures, and proper dispatch documentation are all part of this.
Managing the Agency Team
You will directly supervise and lead a small team of agency production workers throughout the day. That means briefing the team at the start of each shift, assigning tasks, monitoring output and quality, enforcing food safety and hygiene standards, and making sure everything runs to schedule. You will be a firm, fair, and knowledgeable lead that the team can depend on.
Coordinating with the Delivery Driver
As the morning progresses, you will work closely with our Delivery Driver to ensure all packed and labelled orders are ready to load by 8:30 AM. Communication here is key. The stores depend on accurate, on-time deliveries and the production schedule has to align with the departure time every morning without fail.
End of Shift - Clean Down, Stock Records, and Next Day Planning
Before the day closes, you will oversee a full hygiene clean-down of the production area, update stock and yield records, and liaise with Mike and the Logistics Manager to plan production volumes for the following day. Keeping waste low, minimising over-production, and having the right quantities ready at the right time is a daily discipline.
What We Are Looking For
Essential
- Proven experience as a butcher with strong knowledge of meat portioning, pre-pack production, and retail-ready presentation
- Experience managing or supervising staff in a butchery or food production environment, including agency workers
- Hands-on experience producing value-added and pre-packed meat products including burgers, koftas, skewers, and portioned cuts
- Strong goods-in and quality inspection skills when receiving cut and primal meat deliveries
- Solid understanding of food safety, HACCP principles, allergen controls, and temperature monitoring
- Excellent organisational skills and the ability to manage daily production output to a tight morning schedule
- A genuinely hands-on approach - you lead from the floor, not from the sidelines
- Able to work Monday to Friday with an early morning start
Desirable
- Experience in a food production hub, wholesale butchery, central production kitchen, or multi-site food retail environment
- Familiarity with yield management, wastage control, and stock reporting
- Some experience with whole carcass or primal breakdown, even if not the primary focus of the role
- Experience handling Piri Piri marinaded or spatchcock poultry products
- Food Safety Level 2 or Level 3 qualification
- Experience with pre-pack labelling systems or production management documentation
Why Join Eric Lyons?
The Hours
Monday to Friday only. No weekends, no split shifts, no late nights. Your schedule is consistent, your finish time is predictable, and your evenings and weekends are entirely your own.
The Role in the Business
Every pre-pack in our grab-and-go fridges, every whole chicken in a store counter, every strip loin and leg of lamb our butchers work with - it all comes from this facility and it all starts with you. The quality and consistency of what you produce directly shapes what our customers experience in every one of our stores.
The Profit Share Scheme
We believe in sharing our success. Rather than a standard end-of-year bonus, Eric Lyons distributes 10% of net company profit equally among all staff. Based on last year's figures, that equated to approximately £500 to £700 per person. As the business grows, so does the pot.
The Team
You will work directly alongside Dan Lyons, Operations Director, Mike, Operations Manager, our Head Chefs, and our Logistics Manager, as well as our Delivery Driver who you will coordinate with daily. This is a tight-knit, hard-working team that takes real pride in what they produce.
The Growth
Our store network is expanding and our production volumes are growing with it. The right person in this role will have every opportunity to grow alongside the business.
The Benefits
- Annual Profit Share - 10% of net company profit shared equally across all staff (approximately £500 - £700 per person based on last year's figures)
- 50% Staff Discount (up to £60 per week on full-priced items)
- Company Pension
- Free Uniform
- Free On-Site Parking at Redditch Hub
- 28 Days Holiday Including Bank Holidays
- Birthday Day Off
- Additional Holiday for Long Service
- Quarterly Staff Events
- Free Wisdom Wellness App Subscription
- Cycle to Work Scheme
- Ongoing Training and Development
Career Progression
At Eric Lyons, we develop people from within. This role offers real opportunities to grow into:
- Head of Butchery and Production
- Multi-Site Production Lead
- Operations and Procurement Manager
- Senior Leadership Roles within the Production Division
Pay: £30,500.00-£35,000.00 per year
Benefits:
- Company pension
- Cycle to work scheme
- Discounted or free food
- Employee discount
- On-site parking
- Store discount
Application question(s):
- What is your favourite food?
- Are you a foodie?
- What would you do if we were behind on production for the deliveries?
Experience:
- Food handling: 1 year (preferred)
- Butchery: 1 year (preferred)
Licence/Certification:
- Driving Licence (required)
Work Location: In person
