Global marketing chief appointed in Interbrew management restructure
Interbrew has promoted its global vice-president for new brands, David van Wees, to global marketing chief.
In his role as senior vice-president for worldwide marketing, Wees replaces Simon Thorpe, who has been made president and chief executive of Interbrew’s American joint venture beer company, Labatt USA.
Thorpe was responsible for last month’s appointment of Bartle Bogle Hegarty to the £14.35m UK advertising business (MW November 6). He also handed the global advertising business for its Belgian white beer Hoegaarden to BBH (MW November 13).
Wees’ promotion follows a string of top management changes at the Belgian brewer. In his new role, Thorpe replaces Steve Cahillane, who recently took over the UK and Ireland operations as regional president (MW October 30). Cahillane replaced Stewart Gilliland, who was promoted to zone president for Canada.
As part of the restructure, UK marketing director Richard Evans was promoted to the global role of vice-president for commercial strategy, responsible for managing Interbrew’s international brand portfolio.
Category and brands director Phil Rumbol was promoted to replace Evans and will report to chief planning and performance officer Jo van Biesbroeck. Evans now works closely with the chief commercial officer Brent Willis, who was promoted to his post this summer (MW July 3). Willis was previously global marketing chief.
