According to the global drinks giant, the changes will see the global marketing function move towards a “category led approach”. The company’s aim is to reflect the increased focus on category management within Diageo. As part of this, two new category head roles have been created – global category director – vodka, gin and rums and global category director – whisk(e)y.
David Gates, currently global brand director for Johnnie Walker will become the new global category director – whisk(e)y, effective July 1 2010. Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) marketing and innovation director Edward Pilkington is to become the new global category director – vodka, gin and rums, effective August 1 2010. There will be no change to the Guinness and Baileys global brand teams.
Diageo’s Reserve brand group, managed by Rodolphe Paoli, will now also report directly io Andy Fennell, chief marketing officer for Diageo.
The new category director roles will be accountable for conceiving a total category strategy and delivering that strategy across Diageo’s portfolio.
Andy Fennell said: “This move towards a category approach in marketing will enable Diageo to move more quickly to access faster growth, reaching all the relevant price points and motivations and adopting a simpler approach. We believe this is the right move to evolve the business to meet the demands of the ever changing environment and deliver our growth targets.”
The restructure will also see current global category director whisk(e)y, gins and Reserve Brands, Alberto Gavazzi, become general manager, North and South LAC business clusters, within the Latin America and Caribbean region of Diageo International. (Diageo NorthLAC comprises the Caribbean, Jamaica and Central America, Free Trade Zones and duty free border stores in the Americas; SouthLAC comprises the Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador markets).
The replacement for the Johnnie Walker global brand director and marketing and innovation director for Latin America will be announced once they have been appointed.
