The posting
Product Launch Manager
Black Girl Vitamins | Reports to the CEO | Chicago preferred, remote considered within three hours of Central time
About Black Girl Vitamins
Black Girl Vitamins is one of the fastest-growing wellness companies in the country, and the first supplement brand built specifically for Black women. We started as a direct-to-consumer business and now reach our community through our website, Amazon, and Walmart, with a subscription base of women who stay with us for years because we were built for them.
We have reached the point where the challenge is no longer proving that our customer wants what we make. The next chapter is building the team, the systems, and the launch engine required to become one of America’s defining women’s wellness companies. Over the next twelve months we will bring 15 to 20 products, relaunches, and merchandise drops to the women who count on us. This role exists to make sure every one of them arrives the way she deserves: complete, on time, and thoughtfully done.
The role
Today, no one person owns the full journey of a launch. Products get made, pages get built, emails get written, and inventory arrives, but the work is spread across product development, growth, supply chain, and creative with nobody holding the whole picture. The result is a scramble in the final days before every launch, and launches that rely on the executive team to bring them together.
You will change that. From the moment we decide to make a product until the day it goes live on our website and Amazon, the launch is yours. You are not a coordinator who sends reminders. You are the person who holds the integrated plan, the schedule, the readiness of every team, and the responsibility for clearing whatever stands in the way.
What you will do
Own the integrated critical path. Build the launch plan for every new SKU, relaunch, and merchandise drop. Set the milestones, keep every team aligned to them, and know at any moment exactly where a launch stands and what needs attention.
Watch the physical journey. From formulation and packaging approvals through samples, testing, compliance, component lead times, production, freight, warehouse receipt, Amazon FBA availability, and DTC inventory readiness. Most launch problems start upstream, and you will see them early enough to solve them calmly.
Design how launches begin. Create the intake process that the executive team, product development, and growth complete for every new launch, so that scope, target date, channels, quantities, and ownership are agreed before work starts.
Build the launch system. Within your first 30 days, stand up readiness checklists for large launches and smaller rollouts, plus Asana templates that become the shared source of truth every team works from.
Understand the business behind the launch. You do not own the P&L or the demand forecast, but you understand inventory availability, launch quantities, channel sequencing, the promotional calendar, margin, bundle and subscription implications, and forecast assumptions well enough to raise a hand when a launch plan does not make commercial sense.
Make sure growth has covered every base. Think through the social, creator, email, SMS, creative, and Amazon launch plan alongside the Head of Growth and their team. Creative strategy belongs to growth; confirming that every piece is planned, sequenced, and ready belongs to you.
Clear the path. Reprioritize work across teams when a launch needs it, bring in contractors or outside help when that is the fastest route, and bring decisions that sit above your line to the executive team promptly.
Prepare the go/no-go. The CEO makes the final call on every launch. Your job is to make that call easy: a plan in Asana that shows readiness by team, the open risks, and your recommendation.
Hand off with care. At go-live, the growth team takes ownership of performance and readouts. You make sure they inherit a launch with nothing missing.
What you own and what you do not
You own the integrated timeline, launch readiness, the intake and checklist system, and clearing blockers.
Product Development owns formulation and the science behind each product. Supply Chain owns purchasing, production, and logistics. Growth owns creative strategy and post-launch performance. The executive team owns the go/no-go and decides how large each launch is. This role is not where every launch task lands; it is where every launch task is tracked, sequenced, and brought to completion.
Your authority
For the launches you own, you carry the executive team’s mandate to drive decisions across teams rather than simply coordinate them. You can reprioritize a team’s work, engage outside help, and hold leaders to the commitments they have made, always with the respect and clarity that lets people do their best work. Everything between the decision to launch and the go/no-go is yours to run.
Who you are
You have the experience. With roughly 3 to 8 years of experience owning complex cross-functional execution, with evidence that you have personally guided projects involving multiple senior stakeholders. That could be shipping physical products at a startup or DTC brand, running an agency or events operation, managing a build, or delivering software. Years matter less than what you have shipped.
You are low-bureaucracy. You do not default to process for process’s sake. You use enough structure to create clarity, then adjust the system when reality changes.
You know what truly matters. When 40 things could be done and only 15 must be done, you can tell the difference, and you can explain it kindly to the people whose work did not make the list. With 15 to 20 launches a year, knowing what does not need to happen is your most important skill.
You understand modern consumer marketing. Instagram, TikTok, Meta, email, SMS, creator content, and Amazon product pages. You know enough to judge whether growth has built a credible launch plan, and you know what an Amazon listing needs on day one.
You have commercial fluency. You can read an inventory position, a launch forecast, and a promotional calendar and notice when they do not add up.
You are fluent in Asana or an equivalent tool and you build systems that other people genuinely want to use.
You follow through, every time. People describe you as the person who makes things happen and makes it feel easy to work with you. You are comfortable asking a senior leader for a deliverable and comfortable saying, with care and with evidence, that a launch is not ready.
You care about our customer. You will spend time with our community, read reviews, study the data, and build real intuition for what she expects from a brand built for her. You understand that every launch is a promise to her. A personal connection to our community is a strong plus.
Your first 90 days
30 days: Launch readiness checklists and Asana templates are live. You have mapped every launch currently in flight, including the physical critical path for each.
60 days: You have guided one full launch end to end, from intake to go-live, on the committed date.
90 days: You run a launch where leadership’s involvement is a status update and a go/no-go decision, nothing more.
How you will be measured
Three numbers. On-time launch rate of at least 90 percent against the committed date. Launch readiness of at least 95 percent of critical deliverables completed before go-live, so dates are never met by shipping something half-finished. And a measurable, quarter-over-quarter reduction in executive interventions and escalations per launch. We will also track preventable issues in the first 14 days after launch as a health check on the system, not as a compensation metric.
Compensation and location
Competitive base salary plus a performance bonus tied to the launch scorecard above. Chicago is strongly preferred. Remote candidates within three hours of Central time will be considered.
Hiring process
A screening call, a conversation with the CEO about how you have gotten hard things done, a conversation with the Head of Growth and the Head of Product Development, and a final-round live case: a real launch, a short runway, and a few deliberate obstacles. You present the plan.
How to apply
Apply and include a short note describing the most difficult thing you have shipped, what got in the way, and how you handled it.
Equal Opportunity Statement
Black Girl Vitamins is an equal opportunity employer and values diversity and inclusion. We are committed to maintaining a work environment that is free of discrimination and harassment and that provides equal opportunity for all employees and applicants regardless of race, color, religion, sex, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, or any other protected characteristic under applicable law.
