M&S has made a number of senior appointments as it strives to boost its food business before its products replace Waitrose’s on Ocado’s website next year.
Pav Anand, who has spent the past six years as Tesco strategy director, has been appointed M&S head of food strategy and special projects.
Lisa Raschia, Sainsbury’s head of technical fresh since December last year, becomes M&S’s head of produce and horticulture. Before joining Sainsbury’s, Raschia spent nine years at Tesco, in roles including category buying manager of prepared foods.
David Stokes, former supply chain director at Danish Crown, has been appointed M&S head of sourcing. He will be accountable for co-ordinating sourcing strategy across all categories.
Laurissa Kuligowski, a former PwC consultant, has joined M&S as commercial strategy and operations manager.
The new recruits will report to food commercial director George Wright, who joined M&S earlier this year, after departing Tesco as commercial director for convenience.
The “key appointments” were announced in a presentation to investors, in which M&S said food MD Stuart Machin was striving to ‘create a food team that combines a mix of established M&S knowledge and new talent’.
On Raschia’s appointment, the presentation said: ‘Produce is a crucial category as we want to be top of mind for fresh and shift customer perception that we’re much more than a ready meal/special occasion retailer.’ It said M&S currently ‘under index[es] in this category and there is an opportunity for growth’.
M&S has also appointed a head of data science as part of a “talent drive” seeking to make more of customer data. Mehdi Hosseini, a former Sky lead data scientist, takes the new role.
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