Star buyer: Stuart Hargreaves senior buyer, Morrisons Hargreaves joined Morrisons in 1983, working part-time two evenings a week after college. Between 1987 and 1989, he worked within operations, fresh and frozen food. In 1989 he became part of a sales team responsible for produce, fresh foods, meat and bread, before moving to grocery buying in 1994 as a trainee buyer across categories including condiments, desserts, and cereals. He was promoted to senior buyer in 2004 and is now responsible for coffee and cereals. Sarah Armstrong Buying manager, cereals and cereal bars, Tesco Armstrong began her buying career at Alliance UniChem (now Alliance Boots). She spent four years buying and developing health and beauty products and became healthcare category buying manager. She started at Tesco in January this year as buying manager for cereals and cereal bars. Vanessa Pearson Cereal buyer, Sainsbury's Pearson has worked for Sainsbury's for four-and-a-half years after joining the retailer's graduate programme in 2003. She has worked in a number of fresh food categories such as pizza, seasonal party food and soup and took up the role of cereals category buyer in February this year. Phil Hancock Cereal buyer, Asda Hancock has worked for Asda for the past nine-and-a-half years holding various roles. Most recently he held the position of confectionery buyer from January 2004 but moved to cereals towards the end of 2005. Andy Kerrighan Biscuits buyer, Asda Kerrighan is responsible for biscuit buying at Asda but his role overlaps with the cereals category as well because he deals with cereal bars. Lorna Harrison Senior buying manager, breakfast cereal, preserves, sugar and home baking, Tesco Harrison joined Tesco's beer, wine and spirits department in 2001 as a commercial graduate trainee. She became assistant buyer and then buyer, before moving to cereals in 2004. Assessing the success of the redesign of Tesco's own-label cereals has been part of her focus in the past year, along with Tesco's continued emphasis on health.

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