Senior Thermal Process Engineer in Saint Louis, Missouri at Deli Star Corporation
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Job Description
About Deli Star: Who We Are
Deli Star is a next-generation food manufacturing company with a clear purpose: to nourish life through protein with integrity. We specialize in fresh, sous vide cooked proteins and patented food-safety technologies, serving some of the most trusted brands, and culinary teams across the United States. Our mission is ambitious: to build a world-class fresh sous vide system. We are working towards a future in which safe, nutritious, high-quality protein is fresh and accessible to more people.
Deli Star is not a typical food manufacturer. We combine the scientific rigor, quality standards and operational discipline required in food manufacturing with the energy, creativity and entrepreneurial mindset of a growth company. With a team of 150 employees and growing, we are large enough to make a meaningful impact while remaining small enough for talented people to influence how the company evolves.
We are proud of our strong customer partnerships, our rapid growth and our long-term commitment to building an innovative, technology-enabled manufacturing platform.
Our people-first culture is grounded in three core values: Trust, Resilience, and Creativity.
Role Overview
The Sr. Thermal Process Engineer is a senior operational leader responsible for the design, optimization, and scalability of Deli Star’s manufacturing processes, equipment, and facilities systems.
This role sits at the core of the Build team, leading Thermal Processing, Cook and Chill Processes, Plant Facilities functions for Deli Star operations. Food Safety & Quality, and Product Development to drive yield, uptime, throughput, and compliant scale-up. The Sr. Process Engineer ensures that plant utilities, equipment, and processes are engineered for reliability, food safety, and profitable growth. Plant utilities include HVAC, Boiler/Steam System, Refrigeration, Compressed Air, and Electrical System.
This role plays a critical part in advancing Deli Star’s fresh sous vide and cook-chill manufacturing platform by ensuring processes are robust, repeatable, and scalable.
Key Responsibilities
1. Process & Equipment Engineering
- Design, implement, and optimize Sous Vide and Chilling processes and production line layouts.
- Lead facility and equipment selection, specification, installation, and commissioning.
- Identify automation, equipment, and process opportunities to increase capacity, yield, and efficiency.
- Ensure all equipment and processes meet customer, regulatory, and food safety requirements.
2. Manufacturing Leadership
- Lead and supervise daily Thermal processing manufacturing operations to ensure production targets are achieved safely, efficiently, and on schedule.
- Manage, coach, and develop production team members to improve performance, engagement, and accountability.
- Ensure strict compliance with food safety standards, including HACCP, GMP, sanitation, and regulatory requirements.
- Coordinate production schedules with planning, maintenance, quality assurance, and supply chain teams to maximize operational efficiency.
3. Continuous Improvement & Performance Optimization
- Analyze throughput, downtime, and workflow to identify constraints and improvement opportunities.
- Track, trend and improve KPI’s and report to Sr. Leadership.
- Work closely with Technology group to compile, organize and analyze data to optimize the sous vide process.
- Lead root cause analysis for process failures, equipment issues, and quality deviations.
- Drive Lean, CI, and Operational Excellence initiatives with measurable impact.
- Track, trend, and report key operational metrics monthly.
4. Facility and Mechanical Leadership
- Lead the Facility Maintenance team, including staffing, training, and scheduling.
- Develop and continuously improve preventive and predictive maintenance programs.
- Oversee Facility mechanical systems including boilers, HVAC, Refrigeration, compressed air (PMs, work orders, spare parts, downtime tracking).
- Manage the facility budget and report performance to senior leadership.
5. Project Management & Cross-Functional Collaboration
- Lead capital projects, equipment upgrades, and plant engineering initiatives.
- Manage contractor and equipment vendor relationships.
- Partner with Finance to develop CapEx justifications, ROI models, and cost-impact analysis.
- Collaborate with Manufacturing, FSQA, Product Development, and Supply Chain to support plant performance and scale-up.
6. Process Validation & Scale-Up
- Lead process and equipment qualification and validation (IQ/OQ/PQ).
- Oversee new product and process validation documentation and execution.
- Partner with Product Development to ensure R&D concepts are scalable and plant-ready.
- Ensure all validated processes meet food safety, regulatory, and quality system requirements.
- Temperature mapping of critical Thermal Processing equipment, validation product cooks meet uniformity and food safety requirements.
Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering or related technical discipline
- 5+ years of food manufacturing, process engineering, or plant engineering experience
- Experience with sous vide or cook-chill manufacturing processes is a strong plus
- Experience with operation and design of Boiler, Refrigeration, HVAC, Electrical and other plant utilities
- Strong working knowledge of USDA, FDA, HACCP, GFSI/SQF
- Experience with Lean Manufacturing, CI, Six Sigma preferred
- Proficient in CAD, Minitab, Microsoft Office, Google Workspace