Commercial Finance Bid Analyst

Knaphill, Surrey
Impact Food Group

Commercial Finance Bid Analyst

Impact Food Group

At Impact Food Group, we re more than just a school caterer. We re on a mission to create a positive food culture and help more students enjoy healthier, better-quality food. Making a positive social impact is at the heart of everything we do. We re constantly learning, evolving, and improving every way, every day.

Through our industry-leading brands Innovate, Hutchison, Cucina, and Chapter One we cater for over 800,000 students and operate in more than 900 schools nationwide, growing every year.

We re now looking for a talented and highly organised Commercial Finance Bid Analyst to join our Shared Services Team and play a vital role in supporting our people operations and employee experience.

Guided by our values, integrity, bold, impactful, humble, and community; you will help us shape a workplace and culture we can all be proud of.

What you ll be doing

We are looking for a sharp, commercially minded Finance professional to join our growing team. In this pivotal role, you will be the bridge between our Sales and Operations departments, ensuring that every new contract we win is both competitive and profitable.

This is not a traditional accounting role; it is a strategic position for someone who enjoys the fast-paced nature of sales, possesses a strong analytical toolkit, and wants to see the direct financial impact of their work through the entire contract lifecycle.

Key Responsibilities

• Financial Modelling: Support the building and refining of bespoke budgets for new business bids, ensuring labour costs, food margins, and overheads are accurately projected.
• Tender Analysis: Carefully review Invitation to Tender (ITT) documents to identify financial risks, mandatory requirements, and commercial opportunities.
• Post-Win Commercial Analysis: Reviewing how newly won contracts perform against the original budget. You will conduct Actual vs. Bid reviews to spot variances, highlight risks, and help make our future pricing even sharper.
• Strategic Collaboration: Attend and contribute to approval calls with the Sales Team and Directors to provide financial validation for bid submissions.
• Performance Benchmarking: Develop and maintain commercial benchmarks (e.g., GP percentages, labour ratios, uptakes) to guide the Sales team in creating realistic proposals.
• Retention & Extensions: Partner with the Operations Team to re-model financials for existing clients looking to extend their contracts, ensuring terms remain viable.
• Stakeholder Liaison: Act as the primary point of contact for financial advice for the Sales team, providing clear explanations of complex data to non-finance colleagues.

More about you

• Solid Finance Background: You must have a deep understanding of P&L mechanics, margin analysis, and cost allocation. Ideally, you will have equivalent, hands-on Commercial Finance/FP&A experience.
• Prior Bidding/Pricing Experience: We need someone who can hit the ground running. You should have experience in a similar commercial pricing or bid analysis role. Experience in contract catering is a massive bonus.
• Advanced Excel: You ll be building complex, multi-tab models that need to be both accurate and easy for others to navigate.
• High Attention to Detail: Missing a single clause in a tender or a formula error in a budget can be the difference between a winning bid and a loss-making contract.
• Strong People Skills: You need the diplomacy to tell a Sales Manager No” when a deal doesn’t make sense, while maintaining a collaborative partnership.
• Commercial Acumen: The ability to see beyond the spreadsheet and understand the operational reality of running a school kitchen.

If you re a collaborative, solution-focused Finance professional who thrives in a busy and purposeful environment, we d love to hear from you. Join us and be part of a team transforming lives through the power of food, making a genuine difference for students across the UK.