General trade and modern trade sales, territory and area sales management, brand and category teams, plant production and quality, and the depot, C&F and distribution roles behind them, across India and the UAE.
Overview
Mars Consultancy is an FMCG recruitment agency, hiring since 2015 for food and beverage, personal care, home care, dairy, confectionery and packaged-goods companies. We fill field sales and distribution roles, modern trade and e-commerce account roles, brand and category teams, and plant production, quality and supply-chain positions across India and the UAE.
FMCG is a distribution business before it is a product business, and the hiring reflects that. A Sales Officer is not hired to fill a chair, they are hired to run a beat: a fixed list of outlets, a set of distributors, a secondary sales number and a route that has to be walked every week. The right candidate is usually already walking a similar beat for a competitor in the same territory, which makes territory mapping, not job-portal search, the actual sourcing method.
The second thing that trips up FMCG mandates is that one company hires three unrelated kinds of people. Field sales lives on territory knowledge and outlet relationships. Plant production and quality live on FSSAI, GMP and shift discipline. Brand, category and trade marketing live on numbers owned in a P&L. A recruiter who treats all three as one requisition list will be slow on all three.
From requirement briefing to a suitable candidate closing.
For clients in Mumbai, Thane, Navi Mumbai and other Indian cities, and in the UAE.
We are paid by the companies that hire, never by candidates.
The hard part
A Sales Officer who has worked one general trade belt cannot be dropped into a different beat, even across the same city, and be productive from month one. The outlet relationships, the distributor equations and the local language are the job. We map candidates by the territory and the channel they actually cover, then check distributor handling and secondary sales ownership before the CV goes anywhere.
General trade runs on beat coverage, distributor ROI and retailer credit. Modern trade runs on chain buyers, listing fees, planograms and joint business plans. Quick commerce and e-commerce run on platform listings, visibility spends and dark-store fill rates. The same designation sits over all three, so we screen on the channel someone has actually carried a number in, not on the title on the offer letter.
FMCG field salaries are split across fixed, variable, TA/DA and a two-wheeler or fuel allowance, so a headline CTC can hide an in-hand figure well below what the candidate expects. Most late-stage drop-offs we see in this sector are structure, not amount. We put the split, the incentive trigger and the reimbursement cycle in front of the candidate at shortlist stage rather than at offer stage.
A Production Supervisor or QA Chemist at a Palghar or Taloja unit is screened on FSSAI and GMP exposure, shift working, line and batch experience and the ability to live within reach of the plant. A brand or category manager in Andheri or BKC is screened on the P&L, the launches and the ATL/BTL spends they have owned. Running both through one pipeline is why FMCG mandates stall.
A summer beverage or ice-cream season, a festive push or a new-SKU launch fixes the date the team must be on the ground, and no amount of recruiter time moves it. These are planned backwards from the market date as volume drives, with the expected offer-to-joining drop built into the target so the beats are actually covered rather than staffed on paper.
Roles
Use cases
Common shapes of requirement in this sector, and how each one is run. These are illustrative patterns rather than accounts of specific engagements.
Track record
Across India and in the UAE. Our longest record is in the Mumbai region, and these are the belts where we have hired most for this sector. For most roles below management there, travel time decides whether an offer is accepted, so we screen for it.
Talk to the sector deskFMCG head offices and India sales and marketing teams, brand, category, trade marketing and key account roles sit here.
Distributor and depot territory for the eastern MMR, plus the warehousing belt that carries C&F, depot and logistics roles.
Food, beverage and personal care manufacturing, production, quality, packaging and plant maintenance hiring, sourced from the local catchment.
Navi Mumbai processing and packaging units, and the APMC and distribution cluster feeding Navi Mumbai general trade.
Dense general trade beats and the residential catchment most field sales and depot staff are actually hired from.
Services
Who we hire for
We hire for food and beverage manufacturers, dairy and confectionery companies, personal care and home care brands, packaged foods and snacking businesses, and the distributor, depot and third-party manufacturing operations behind them, from regional brands building a first sales team to national companies expanding coverage.
Discuss a requirementYes. We hire for food and beverage, personal care, home care, dairy, confectionery and packaged-goods companies, covering field sales and distribution, modern trade and e-commerce accounts, brand and category teams, plant production and quality, and depot, C&F and supply chain roles across India and the UAE.
By mapping the territory before searching it. We identify who is already running a comparable beat and distributor set in that area, then screen on secondary sales ownership, outlet count, distributor handling and local language. Territory fit decides the shortlist in FMCG field sales, because outlet relationships and route knowledge are the job rather than a line on the CV.
Yes, and they are sourced as three different pipelines. General trade candidates are screened on beat coverage, distributor ROI and retailer credit; modern trade on chain buyers, listings, planograms and joint business plans; quick commerce and e-commerce on platform listings, visibility spends and fill rates. The designation is often identical, so we screen on the channel the number was actually carried in.
Yes, production supervisors and managers, QA and QC chemists, food technologists, packaging development and plant maintenance roles for units in the Palghar, Vasai, Tarapur and Taloja belt. These are screened on FSSAI and GMP exposure, line and batch experience, shift willingness and reachable commute, and sourced from the catchment around the plant rather than across the city.
Because FMCG field pay is split across fixed, variable, TA/DA and vehicle or fuel allowance, and a headline CTC can hide an in-hand figure well below expectation. We put the fixed-versus-incentive split, the incentive trigger and the reimbursement cycle in front of the candidate at shortlist stage rather than at offer stage, which is where most late-stage drops in this sector are actually created.
Yes. Summer beverage seasons, festive pushes and new-SKU launches are run as volume drives planned backwards from the market date, with the expected offer-to-joining drop built into the target and candidates followed through to joining, so the beats are covered on the ground rather than closed on paper.
We have hired for FMCG clients across India and in the UAE. In Mumbai, Thane and Navi Mumbai that has included head-office roles in Andheri and BKC, general trade beats across Thane, Kalyan, Dombivli and Panvel, warehousing and depot roles around Bhiwandi, and plant hiring in the Palghar, Vasai, Tarapur and Taloja belt. Upcountry, other-state and UAE mandates run from the same desks.
Related sectors
Get started
Tell us the role, the team around it and the deadline. We'll come back within one business day with questions and an honest view of what it will take.
Start hiring