US – American multinational food, snack, and beverage corporation PepsiCo has appointed four new top executives within its North American divisions, who will be taking office effective from July 1, 2022.
The new appointees will be in the roles of the president of PepsiCo Foods Canada (PFC), a new president of the Gatorade Performance Portfolio (GPP) within Pepsi Beverages North America (PBNA), as well as new chief customer and chief marketing officers (CMO) at Frito-Lay North America (FLNA).
Rachel Ferdinando, currently chief marketing officer for Frito-Lay US, has been named president of PFC, and she will oversee PFC human resources, finance, customer development, field sales, marketing, supply chain, and IT, R&D, food service, and transformation.
During her tenure as chief marketing officer, she focused on end-to-end marketing leadership and portfolio transformation.
Prior to joining PepsiCo in 2017, she was vice president and global sector leader for family care at Kimberly-Clark Corp.
She also has held various global marketing and general management leadership roles at GlaxoSmithKline, including managing director, vice president, and general manager for the Malaysia and Brunei operations, and vice president and global business leader of Digestive Health.
Meanwhile, Cara Keating, currently president of PFC, is joining the FLNA business as chief customer officer.
In her new role, Ms. Keating will lead the sales function overseeing strategy, sales planning, and commercialization for Frito-Lay’s US customer sales organization, with responsibility for retail, e-commerce, PepsiCo Customer Teams, Hispanic business unit, and food service businesses.
Ms. Keating has held progressively senior roles in customer development and field leadership across Canada since 2004 when she joined PepsiCo.
Elsewhere, Mike Del Pozzo, currently chief customer officer of Frito-Lay US, will be returning to PBNA as president and general manager of GPP, which includes Gatorade, Propel, Muscle Milk, Evolve, and current and future innovation portfolio.
In this role, Mr. Del Pozzo will lead the business, focusing on sales, customer management, brand building, strategy, and engaging customers and consumers through innovative portfolio plans and dynamic marketing driving category leadership.
Prior to his current role as CCO of Frito-Lay US, he was senior vice president, commercial planning across PBNA, having responsibilities over revenue management, e-commerce, and innovation planning and governance.
Mr. Del Pozzo has worked across all PepsiCo business units, including PBNA, Quaker Foods North America, FLNA, and PepsiCo global.
Additionally, Brett O’Brien, currently general manager and senior vice president of GPP, has been named CMO of Frito-Lay US.
In his new role, he will lead all marketing initiatives, overseeing brand marketing, innovation, strategic insights, design, and media.
Mr. O’Brien has led the Gatorade and Propel brands, and has grown the portfolio to now include Muscle Milk, Evolve, and other breakthrough innovation that addresses the needs of athletes.
Since joining PepsiCo in 2001, he has held marketing roles across juice, energy, lifestyle programming, and Pepsi Music including overseeing the MTN DEW trademark, Sierra Mist, and Pepsi’s flavored soft drink brands.
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