Power List 2013 21-30

Martin Glenn, CEO, United Biscuits 21 (13)
Glenn’s only been in his new role for a few weeks, but his track record at PepsiCo and Birds Eye speaks for itself, and making himself available after resigning, CEO Benoit Testard was unceremoniously slung out by UB earlier this month. Once Glenn has found his feet, this fmcg stalwart will surely make his mark in the category quicker than you can p- p-pick up a Penguin.

Tim Steiner, CEO, Ocado 22 (36)
Steiner has pulled off a remarkable turnaround in Ocado’s fortunes. Shares have rocketed from a low of under 50p last summer to over 250p last week, as he sealed a major refinancing in the autumn, recruited former M&S boss Stuart Rose as chairman and, last week, secured a tie-up with Morrisons that could simultaneously transform its finances, and see it reclassified as a technology business.

Doug Gurr, UK VP, Amazon 23
Amazon is powerful enough to chance its arm at pretty much whatever it likes, backed by a bulging wallet and a huge number of loyal customers. Tasked with growing grocery, to date Gurr has only made a dent in the ambient bulk-buy grocery market. Fresh and frozen food is available, but only from third parties, resulting in multiple sporadic deliveries and a large postage bill for the privilege.

Hubert Patricot, President, CCE Euro Group 24 (15)
While the weather unquestionably proved a dampener on CCE’s performance in 2012, Patricot’s bigger concerns are with the turbulent economic headwinds buffeting the Eurozone. The UK is actually performing better than the rest of Europe, and Patricot has abandoned plans to acquire the German bottling business from the Coca-Cola Company to concentrate on trying to boost shareholders’ cash returns.

Alan Clark, CEO, SAB Miller 25
Like Ivan Menezes (qv), former COO Clark will still be feeling his way after he stepped up to his new role three months earlier than expected, as legendary CEO Graham Mackay relinquished his responsibilities due to ill health. Shares rallied after a dip, full-year revenue is up 7%, and SAB’s Peroni is continuing to grow in the UK, but Mackay’s position as chairman is being kept open.

Alison Cooper, CEO, Imperial Tobacco 26 (22)
Last month Imperial Tobacco posted its first fall in profits since listing on the London Stock Exchange 17 years ago, amid falling sales in developed markets, coupled with smokers cutting back in the UK. However, Imperial’s fortunes will have been buoyed, along with the rest of the trade, by the government’s decision to omit legislation on plain packaging from the recent Queen’s Speech.

Mike Coupe, Group comm dir, Sainsbury’s 27 (29)
“Not everyone in the room can be on our bus,” Coupe warned suppliers at a briefing earlier this year. But amid plans to grow own-label penetration and share, and scale back branded promotions, his sure hand has helped Sainsbury’s deliver continuing sales growth - when everyone expected Sainsbury’s to be squeezed - while rivals have veered off the rails. He remains red-hot favourite to replace Justin King (qv) at the helm.

Akeel Sachak, MD, Rothschild 28 (20)
Though the AG Barr and Britvic merger, on which Sachak advised Barr, is on hold over possible competition issues, Rothschild’s global head of consumer has still been involved in more major M&A deals in the food and drink sector than any other bank this year, orchestrating, among others, the merger of Milk Link and Arla, and PAI Partners’ acquisition of R&R Ice Cream.

Peter Lauritzen, CEO, Arla Foods UK 29 (42)
This year looks set to be another big one for Lauritzen after he completed the merger with Milk Link in 2012. In recent months we’ve seen the extension of Arla’s Anchor brand into Cheddar, the launch of two branded milk drinks and major progress made on the Aylesbury mega dairy, which opens this autumn. Cravendale has also just picked up the milk supply contract for Starbucks UK coffee shops from rival Dairy Crest.

Jonathan Warburton, Chairman, Warburtons 30 (24)
Warburton implemented a management clearout last year, stepping in to run day-to-day operations as intense competition, declining bread sales, and rising wheat prices created a perfect storm. Of all the bakeries, Warburtons is the biggest and best invested, and this week made a rare acquisition to further its diversification, but though sales grew 4% in 2012, profits are down.