Mark Kupelian of Asda

Kupelian joined Asda as a graduate over 10 years ago

Asda

’s head of pricing Mark Kupelian has been promoted to senior director in strategy and enablement at Walmart.

As head of pricing, Kupelian was responsible for the Asda Price Guarantee, pricing strategy and promotions - and played a key role in Asda maintaining its 16-year winning streak on price in The Grocer 33 Gold Awards.

In his new role, he will develop Walmart’s pricing standards in international markets, covering everything from measurement and reporting through to strategy.

“I’m really looking forward to taking my experience from Asda and adding value within Walmart’s vast global business,” said Kupelian, who will still be based in the UK, working out of London and Leeds and travelling to Walmart’s international markets.

“Working for Walmart is a great opportunity and I can’t wait to get started. I’m sure that there will be plenty of new and interesting challenges and opportunities along the way.”

Kupelian joined Asda more than 10 years ago, starting on the graduate programme. He moved into pricing eight years ago and worked in several roles before becoming head of pricing two years ago.

Thomas Hill will take over from Kupelian as head of the Asda pricing team on an interim basis. His background is in analytics, and he will be supported by Wayne Grenfell, whose specialism is insight and market performance.

Kupelian is the latest senior Asda figure to move over to Walmart. Earlier this year, Asda COO Judith McKenna was promoted to executive vice president, strategy and international development at Walmart.

Her departure prompted a reshuffle that saw retail operations manager Mark Ibbotson promoted to retail director and Karen Hubbard to executive director, property and multi-channel.