R&R Ice Cream has promoted Sam Wrist - who started out as a seasonal factory hand - to UK operations director.
The promotion from operations manager gives Wrist responsibility for all operational issues at R&R’s three factories in Leeming Bar, Skelmersdale and Bodmin, in charge of a combined workforce of more than 1,000 employees.
“Sam is a top-quality food production manager with proven operational skills and has made a significant contribution to the R&R success story,” said CEO Ibrahim Najafi.
Wrist, who will take a seat on the R&R management board, began his career at R&R as a seasonal worker on the production line in 1996. Having abandoned plans to study chemistry at university, he joined R&R as a temporary option while deciding what he wanted to do. In the end, he decided to stay and was quickly promoted to team leader. He was then promoted to factory manager before becoming operations manager in 2007.
Wrist’s promotion comes after Najafi took over from James Lambert as group CEO in the summer. Najafi was formerly Europe CEO and before that he was Wrist’s boss, as operations director.
The handover to Najafi followed the sale of R&R - Europe’s largest producer of ice cream by volume - to private equity firm PAI Partners in a £715m deal in April.
Lambert founded R&R - originally Richmond Ice Cream - in 1985 and rapidly expanded the business through acquisition. Over the past five years, the North Yorkshire-based supplier has acquired a number of companies including Kelly’s of Cornwall in the UK and foreign manufacturers such as Eskigel in Italy and Pilpa in France.
Most recently, R&R acquired frozen dessert brand YooMoo and Fredericks Dairies, which holds the UK licence for Mondelez brands.
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