Molson Coors chief commercial officer Michelle St. Jacques announced a series of leadership moves in an all employee email sent today, along with the creation of the Americas Commercial Accelerator, which will be focused on driving “capability building across all geographies and categories.”
The moves will go into effect January 1. St. Jacques stressed the changes are “not a cost-cutting exercise” and more investment will be made to support the Americas Commercial (AmCom) team.
The newly created Americas Commercial Accelerator will bring together the following teams under one umbrella: commercial insights, commercial analytics, media and digital, revenue management and category management.
Jeff Long will lead the Americas Commercial Accelerator as Molson Coors’ first chief commercial enablement officer. He will report to St. Jacques.
Long’s team is expected to include:
- Blake Lopezzo, as VP of commercial insights;
- Erin Schmidt, as director of commercial analytics;
- Brad Feinberg, as VP of media and digital;
- Todd Dombrowski, as VP of revenue management;
- And Nancy Bedwell, as VP of category management.
Although Molson Coors is placing those teams under the same umbrella, St. Jacques stressed that the company’s “commercial leaders will continue to own their respective strategies.”
“The Americas Commercial Accelerator team will work closely with leaders to better and faster enable these strategies,” she added.
Molson Coors’ U.S. sales team is also “realigning its structure” to add “more distributor-facing resources in our priority markets, adding channel specialists to support our independent business in select markets, and adding new roles to support our expansion into non-alc,” St. Jacques wrote.
President of U.S. sales and distributor operations Brian Feiro’s team will include:
- Bill Averill, in the newly created role of VP of marketing activation, overseeing field, shopper and channel marketing, and partnerships;
- James “Junior” Wright III as VP of commercial operations;
- And Andrew McGuire as chief customer officer, leading chain efforts.
In a separate note to Molson Coors’ wholesalers, Feiro offered some addition insights into the restructured sales team, including:
- Adding incremental headcount to support distributor execution in priority markets;
- Adding channel specialists in select markets to support independent on- and off-premise channels;
- Adding 27 roles – “one for each management unit as well as dedicated resources for national accounts and regional chain” to accelerate its non-alc business;
- Adding resources to support priority chains;
- And creating a Commercial Development Xploration Program to attract, retain and develop entry-level talent.
Feiro acknowledged the moves come with “difficult decisions and tradeoffs,” including the elimination of the Sales Management Program, an on-premise focused entry-level team.
Molson Coors will also be “fine-tuning” the structure of its Americas marketing team, with the marketing responsibilities for U.S. craft division Tenth and Blake and Canadian craft division Six Pints shifting to the marketing organization, while the U.S. and Canadian sales team will remain responsible for market activations.
In Canada, Molson Coors will realign its leadership team to simplify operations and focus its commercial plans. Changes include:
- Leslie Malcolm taking the newly created role of VP of marketing to oversee all brands and Six Pints in Canada. She will report to North America CMO Sofia Colucci and serve as a member of the Marketing and Canadian Leadership teams;
- And Dan Lundberg will become GM – on premise in Canada, reporting to Frederic Landtmeters, president of Molson Coors Canada.
All of these changes are being communicated with impacted employees now, as roles and responsibilities across teams will be changing and some workers will be exiting the company, St. Jacques wrote.
“The above changes reflect and support our commitment to invest in the total AmCom business unit as we believe in the role this team plays in achieving our next phase of growth. By building a team that is tighter across geographies and focused on a clear set of priorities, I have no doubt that we will continue to be a force within our industry,” she added.
Molson Coors senior director of corporate affairs Rachel Dickens added that the changes will result in “more total investment in people across our commercial business in the Americas.”
“That includes more frontline distributor-facing positions, more roles in key growth channels like independent retail accounts, more team members to grow our non-alc business, the establishment of a Commercial Development Program for entry-level talent and the creation of a new Americas Commercial Accelerator, which will centralize our commercial capabilities across all geographies and categories.
“As we work to close 2023 strong, these changes will support our continued growth next year and in the future.”
The latest corporate shakeup follows the creation of a new commercial division for the U.S. and Canada and the appointment of St. Jacques as CCO in March. That moved combined sales, marketing, innovation, digital capabilities and the company’s non-alcohol and liquor portfolios in the Americas.
Appointments under that structure included Feiro and Colucci in their current roles, as well as Jamie Wideman as VP innovation, Kevin Nitz as VP non-alc, David Coors as VP hard liquor and the company’s teams in Canada (led by Landtmeters) and Latin America (led by Chris Wensel).