Workforce Wednesday: Meet a Director of Tech Service

“About 15 years ago, customer’s supplier documentation requirements changed, and we had so many more requests,” said Kimberely Challoner, Director of Technical Services with Seneca Foods. 

Challoner handles customer relationships regarding all aspects of labeling regulations, customer databases, and audits. 

“Anything fun and exciting in lines of customer information,” she said. “It’s a lot of regulatory research, and I also work in product research and development.” 

Challoner has grown with Seneca for almost thirty years. She began in a Quality Technologist role and worked her way to her current role where she spends most of her day ensuring customers’ information needs are handled. She also coordinates all the research and development projects within Seneca. 

Challoner says her department completes a variety of services. 

“This includes anything from reformulating something as simple as changing the salt level in brine of corn to something as complex as developing an organic vegetarian chili,” Challoner said. 

“If a customer has questions in the label area, my team is the one that ensures all our labels are compliant with the most current regulations,” Challoner said. 

Challoner earned a Bachelor of Science in Food Science from University of Wisconsin River Falls, though she was not always destined for food science. She began her collegiate experience majoring in elementary education. She was required to take a science course, and she chose food science.  

“I was flipping through the course catalog, and I was like ‘oh, this sounds cool,’” she said. 

Her father worked in the food industry, and she thought it would be interesting. Little did she know she would enjoy it far more than expected. 

“I took that class, and I changed my major promptly,” she said. 

After nearly 30 years in the industry, Challoner says she still loves that every day is different 

“I love the fact that not every day is the same,” she said. “It is always something new and different. It's not just sitting in a spot for 8 hours doing the same thing.” 

She also enjoys educating customers and the end consumers about where their vegetables originate and how nutritious canned vegetables can be. 

“I take that to heart,” she said. “I try and teach people to know where food comes from. That's so important, where it comes from, and there's so many people today who don't understand that green beans are grown in the field.” 

Challoner said a challenge she faces is helping people to understand that agriculture and food production is seasonal for most of the products produced at Seneca.  

“Vegetables in cans are not Legos, we can’t just go in the back and make more,” she said. 

Challoner also faces external employee turnover. 

“We see that because we have people in quality positions at our customers who are constantly turning over, so it's kind of like we're starting fresh each time,” she said. “We get somebody educated and then they move on, so then we educate somebody new. That’s always a challenge.” 

Challoner thoroughly enjoys her role in food production.  

“I would say to look outside the box,” she said. “You never know where you're going to end up. You never know where that one class is going to lead you, so it's always good to take a leap of faith and see what happens.” 

What is something you wish you had known on your first day: 

Patience is always important.  I learned that from my father and every once in a while you have to step back and remember that patience is a good thing.