Alice Fry approaches her job as Product Manager for Excellence Line Ovens and Steam Cookers in the same way she cooks at home: with passion and drive.
Alice Fry thinks big. At the same time, she also has a feel for the little things, the intricacies. In her role as Product Manager for Excellence Line Ovens and Steam Cookers she needs both these strengths. Launching the new premium product line is a mammoth project: a system that incorporates dozens of appliance models is currently being developed and produced. Hundreds of V-ZUG employees are involved. And Alice Fry is the interface between the developers and the market.
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A multi-disciplinary team and everything near at hand in Zug
Internally, she is part of a project team which brings together colleagues from the areas of development, construction, production, design, applications technology and many more. This diversity is key to the major project as the new product line is being developed from scratch in Zug. And proximity is important, too. Thankfully, the distances between things at the Zug production site are short. The office of the design team is only two buildings away from that of the committed Product Manager, and the new production hall is just a few steps away on the other side of the road. Alice, a native of Lucerne, gathers information from the specialists in the various areas, bundles it and passes it on. “I basically just pass information back and forth,” she grins. That’s a bit of an understatement! The product managers have a fair amount of involvement in the decision-making process when it comes to quality management, perfecting all the processes and also applications issues. This calls for a person who is full of energy and can get everyone on board. Someone who can motivate their team and spur them on. For Alice Fry, it’s the perfect job.
She compares product management to cooking, something she loves doing in her free time, saying you need to combine the ingredients and flavours. And you need to try things out, taste them, hone the techniques, present everything appealingly and recycle any leftovers. The keen amateur chef is happy at V-ZUG: “I like the drive for innovation and the global contact combined with our very down-to-earth way of working together.”
It was while she was studying business that her desire developed to one day work in a relatively large global company with its roots in Switzerland – an international environment not too far from the flat she shares with her boyfriend in an old apartment building in Lucerne. She’s been immersed in the Excellence Line project for 2 years and is pleased: “Everyone’s working hard, they’re all really motivated.” She can identify with that. “Don’t just talk about it, get on and do things!” she exclaims, laughing.
“Don’t just talk about it, get on and do things!”
Alice Fry, Product Manager Excellence Line
V-ZUG appliances are the easiest on the market to operate
A big milestone has been reached: ovens and steam cookers offering the highest level of convenience are rolling off the production line. I ask her: Alice, what would you say is the new line’s signature function? The Product Manager leaps up and shows me the oven in her office kitchen. Her fingers fly across the full-size touchscreen on the high-level panel. She taps an app in the left-hand corner. Turns the milled-in CircleSlider. Scrolls through the list function. “It’s just like on a smartphone. V-ZUG appliances are the easiest on the market to operate. And the appliance adjusts to suit you!” The display can be customized. So you can make your top apps favourites. Or choose your preferred background image.
Integrated lists with pertinent settings suggestions also help you get to grips with different cooking processes and inspire you to use new applications. “At V-ZUG we combine the simple and the complex in a single appliance. Anyone can cook easily using steam, and equally, anyone can cook a beef joint to perfection.” So there’s a guarantee of great cooking results as well as ease of operation.
The desire for perfection shows up in the detail
Behind the finished product are thousands of hours of testing to ensure that all the functions on all the appliances work correctly. The desire for perfection shows up in the detail. Alice Fry opens the oven door and points to the indentation near the bottom of the door. “The collection channel catches liquid when you open the door, which makes cleaning easier,” she raves. AutoDoor is another innovation. On the handle-free models the doors open – and close – at the touch of a button. “We go the extra mile; we hone things to perfection.”
The Excellence Line is now on the market. Alice Fry’s primary objective is to make the line a success. “That’s my way of honouring the incredible work that all at V-ZUG are putting into the project. So that they in turn are pleased with my work.”
Alice Fry has a V-ZUG oven in her small kitchen at home, too, albeit only a basic model. It’s out of work, however, whenever she prepares her speciality dish, home-made sushi. These need flavours from all over the world, manual finesse and deft fingers.
Discover the new Excellence Line
Alice Fry
Alice Fry, Product Manager Excellence Line
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