Data Engineer (Cloud & BI Architecture)

About the Opportunity

We’re hiring for a critical new role at First Table, one that requires a deep blend of architectural vision and hands-on execution. This position is for a Data Engineer who will act as the architect and guardian of our data ecosystem, building the foundation that powers our Marketing, Product, and Commercial functions.

You'll lead the technical charge to build a "single source of truth" from scratch. With 2–4 years of experience, you are designing a scalable cloud warehouse (Snowflake/AWS) and a sophisticated semantic layer that ensures our data science and business teams have high-quality, performant, and reliable data at their fingertips.

This is a rare opportunity to be the technical SME and manager of the data flow in a "test-and-learn" start-up culture. You’ll see your architecture translate directly into optimized marketing spend, improved product development, and the rapid deployment of predictive models, making a visible difference to diners and restaurants across NZ, AU, and the UK.

About us

At First Table, our vision is simple: to be the first place diners go to book a table.

Proudly established in Queenstown, New Zealand - where our head office is based -  we've been leading the charge in the hospitality tech industry for over a decade, with operations spanning New Zealand, Australia, and the UK. 

First Table is a dining discovery platform that connects diners to restaurants through their love of food.  Through our clever tech, we help restaurants get their night off to a great start and give diners a compelling reason to try somewhere new. It’s a win-win situation. From early bird offers to last table reservations, we make discovering and booking great dining experiences fast, easy, and rewarding.

At the heart of everything we do are our values: Win-Win-Win, Own It and Grow Together.  These guide how we show up for each other, our restaurant partners, and our diners and they’re a big part of what makes First Table a great place to work.

Learn more about our story here:
www.firsttable.co.nz/our-story

About the role

In this newly created, highly technical role, you will be the subject matter expert for our end-to-end data architecture. Reporting to the Data Lead and guided by a solutions architect, you will be a results-oriented partner to Commercial, Financial, Marketing and Product leaders, translating complex business needs into high-performance data structures.

Your job is to own the movement of data into the warehouse and its delivery into Power BI. You’ll be an essential bridge between raw systems and the intelligence layer, ensuring our data science capability is supported by a stable, scalable infrastructure. From refactoring legacy PHP logic to mastering the trade-offs of ingestion to semantic-layer, you will own the integrity and speed of our data pipeline.

What you’ll be doing

Build the Foundation: Act as the technical SME to design, build, and maintain our cloud data warehouse (Snowflake/AWS) from the ground up.

Architect the Semantic Layer: Comfortable designing robust Star Schema and Kimball models for data application. You’re comfortable architecting the Fact and Dim modelling, that will appropriately define standardised metrics (Customer/Restaurant/Revenue-centric) to ensure 100% consistency in Power BI.

Engineering & Orchestration: Build bespoke ETL/ELT pipelines using Python, Airflow, and middleware connectors, moving data from marketing platforms, product DBs, and third-party APIs.

Legacy Refactoring: Read, interpret, and refactor legacy PHP scripts and data modelling into modern, pythonic data flows.

Power BI Mastery: Optimise ingestion and semantic layers specifically for Power BI, making strategic decisions on Direct Query vs. Import modes to balance latency and cost.

Historical Integrity: Implement Slowly Changing Dimensions (Type 2) to allow Data Scientists to perform accurate point-in-time longitudinal and cohort analysis.

Technical Leadership: Establish best practices for our data architecture, including warehouse set up, data pipelines, ML/AI CI/CD, Infrastructure as Code (IaC), and system monitoring to ensure 99.9% pipeline reliability.

Strategic Support: Partner with Data Scientists to provide the underlying data structures for pricing engines, LTV analysis, and churn prediction.

What you’ll bring

Experience: 2–4 years of hands-on professional experience in Data Engineering.

Cloud Warehousing: experience building Snowflake, AWS Redshift, or similar cloud data architecture environments from day zero.

Technical Stack: Proficient in Python, Airflow, and building APIs. Solid experience with AWS services (S3, Lambda, EC2, Glue), Git, and Docker.

Power BI Expertise: Deep understanding of the Power BI ecosystem, including DAX, Power Query, and semantic layer design.

SQL Mastery: Exceptional proficiency in writing complex, optimized SQL for high-scale data transformation.

Architectural Mindset: Strong understanding of Fact/Dimension logic and how to maintain data lineage from raw source to final report.

Communication: The ability to explain complex architectural choices to non-technical stakeholders and translate business needs into technical specs.

Why you'll love working with us

A high trust and flexible working environment: Remote from Auckland or hybrid from Queenstown, you’ll be enabled to work the way that best suits you, in a high-trust, independent, workflow environment 

Direct measurable impact: Your work will directly inform millions of dollars in marketing spend and sales decisions, showing up in revenue numbers and core business efficiencies, not just vanity metrics. 

Speed to learning & deployment: Drive model conception and deployment quickly, seeing your data solutions move from POC to business impact in days or weeks. 

Complexity & challenge: This is a chance to work with the volume and complexity of data required to build sophisticated MTA, LTV, and Causal Inference models in a fast-growing consumer brand. 

Creative freedom: Shape the entire data  capability from scratch and establish best-practice analytical standards across the organisation. 

Beloved consumer brand: Contribute to a product that diners and restaurants already love, making a visible difference across NZ, AU, and the UK. 

Perks: Free First Table bookings, regular team recognition and social events, and the chance to work with a purpose-led, award-winning brand.

What’s next?

Submit your application, with your CV and a brief cover letter telling us why this role excites you and how your experience sets you up for success. We’ll be reviewing and progressing applications as they come in, so don’t wait to apply.