MINNEAPOLIS – General Mills Inc. today announced a new operating model designed to sharpen focus, advance strategic priorities and accelerate growth.
Effective January 1, the food manufacturer with brands including Cheerios, Nature Valley, Häagen-Dazs, Pillsbury, and Totino’s will split into three segments — cereal, snacks and international; meals and baking solutions; and pet.
In addition, a new commercial function will combine marketing, sales, and consumer insights and analytics to strengthen omnichannel capabilities.
The changes represent another step in General Mills’ enterprise transformation initiative, enabling faster decision-making and sharper resource prioritization, the company said in a press release.
“Winning consumer choice today means responding faster to changing needs,” said Dana McNabb, chief operating officer and incoming CEO of General Mills. “We’re modernizing how we operate, strengthening our capabilities, and turning consumer insights into action more quickly. This new structure better aligns our leadership and resources with our highest priorities and positions us to deliver more consistent, profitable growth.”
The new cereal, snacks and international segment will combine the current Big G cereal and Canada and U.S. snacks operating units within North America retail with the company’s current international segment.
The new meals and baking solutions segment will combine the current U.S. meals and baking solutions operating unit with the company’s current North America foodservice segment.
The new pet segment will be unchanged from the current North America pet segment.
Along with these changes, the company is making the following leadership appointments:
• Ricardo Fernandez will assume an expanded role as segment president, cereal, snacks and international. He currently serves as segment president, international,
• Brett White will be promoted to segment president, meals and baking solutions. He currently serves as president, U.S. meals and baking solutions,
• Liz Mascolo will continue to lead the company’s pet business as segment president.
• Josh Yates will be promoted to chief commercial officer, leading U.S. retail sales and enterprise commercial capabilities, including strategic revenue management, e-commerce, sales and marketing. He is currently chief customer officer, leading U.S. customer-facing sales and omnichannel execution for North America retail. He previously served as vice president, marketing for Cheerios.
White and Yates will join Fernandez, Mascolo and others on General Mills’ senior leadership team.
