FDBusiness.com

Premier Foods is to strengthen its leadership team through the appointment of a chief operating officer to help accelerate its transformation. With the company continuing to deliver on its divestiture and cost reduction plans as well as strategic initiatives to grow its Power Brands, further steps are now being taken to accelerate its journey towards becoming a more focused and profitable food business.

In recognition of the different opportunities and challenges facing the company’s Grocery and Bread businesses, these businesses will in future be managed as two distinct divisions. The focus for Grocery will be on continuing to build momentum behind the branded portfolio, which represents 86% of total Grocery sales. In Bread, a more fundamental approach will be taken to help unlock future value and address the category challenges faced by this division. Premier Foods will, however, continue to preserve appropriate benefits of scale between the two divisions wherever they exist.

Geoff Eaton.

In addition to this structure, and as previously announced, the company expects to deliver further overhead cost reductions in 2013 as it separates recently divested businesses. These will be over and above the £40 million of savings that will be delivered by the end of 2012.

To help execute these strategic changes and ensure continued focus, Premier Foods has appointed Geoff Eaton as chief operating officer and executive director reporting to Michael Clarke, chief executive.

Geoff Eaton has extensive experience of tackling complex financial and operational restructuring projects and creating value through organic growth. Most recently he was chief executive of Uniq, leading a successful turnaround and growth of the company prior to its acquisition by Greencore Group.