by FoodBizDaily.com staff writer
Janury 29 2010 - WalMart officials announced a series of changes at company, including the unification of operating divisions – Logistics, Real Estate and Store Operations under one leadership team. The reorganization will create three distinctive geographic business units – Walmart West, Walmart South and Walmart North.
Raul Vazquez has been promoted to EVP and President of Walmart West; leading Walmart South as EVP and President is Rosalind Brewer. and Hank Mullany has been promoted EVP and President of Walmart North.
Beginning Feb. 1, the company will transfer the responsibility for store merchandising from the Market Team to the Zone Merchandise Supervisors at store level.
Together with John Fleming, Chief Merchant, Wal-Mart is creating a new organization, Store Merchandising Execution, which will connect merchandising more closely to operations and customers. This new organization, led by Andy Barron, Senior Vice President, Store Merchandise Operations, will design merchandise strategies for each of the newly created geographic business units. Mr Barron will report to both John Fleming and to Bill Simon, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer.
As part of the new Global Sourcing structure that was announced yesterday, Senior Vice President Michael Lewis will lead the Global Merchandising Center (GMC) for packaged grocery products. Mr. Lewis will report to Mr.Jack Sinclair and will be responsible for leveraging Wal-Mart global scale to source products for the grocery business.
It was also announced that the operations in Puerto Rico will be aligned with the US.
New online initiative
Eduardo Castro-Wright, Vice Chairman informed that Wal-Mart is creating a new unit that will be responsible for driving online growth around the world – both in developed markets where the company has stores and an online presence and in markets it doesn't. This new organization will be called Global.com.
Wan Ling Martello, formerly the Chief Financial Officer of Walmart International will be the Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Global.com
In her new role, Wan Ling’s primary responsibilities will include: (1) development and execution of a global strategy for e-commerce; (2) establishing cross-functional and cross-border Walmart relationships designed to accelerate and broaden growth in the global online channel; and (3) the creation of technology platforms and applications that can be used effectively in every Walmart market
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Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
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About Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (Wal-Mart) operates retail stores in various formats worldwide. The Company provides an assortment of merchandise and services. Wal-Mart operates in three business segments: Walmart U.S., International and Sam’s Club. The Company’s Walmart U.S. segment accounted for 63.7% of its net sales, during the fiscal year ended January 31, 2009, (fiscal 2009), and operates stores in three different formats in the United States, as well as Wal-Mart’s online retail operations, walmart.com. As of January 31, 2009, its International segment consisted of retail operations in 14 countries and Puerto Rico. This segment generated 24.6% of the Company’s net sales in fiscal 2009. Its Sam’s Club segment consists of membership warehouse clubs in the United States and the segment’s online retail operations, samsclub.com. Sam’s Club accounted