Woolworths appoints new CMO after horror run
Sean Barrett will join Woolies as CMO, after a horror reputational run for the supermarket giant
Woolworths Group has appointed Sean Barrett as its new chief marketing officer, replacing Andrew Hicks, who departed the role in June.
Barrett will start at Woolworths in January, and comes from US supermarket giant Albertsons Companies, which operates 2,300 stores across 34 American states.
According to Woolworths’ announcement, as Albertsons’ chief marketing officer, Barrett drove a “significant brand repositioning” for the brand, and brings “deep experience in leading performance marketing, customer data, generative AI, and advanced ROI measurement” to Woolworths.
This is exactly the hire Woolies needs.
An import isn’t bound by the local status quo. And that gives him a real chance to shake things up across the marketing functions. Anyone who’s come into contact with Woolies marketing knows it’s long overdue and the whole structure and process could use a proper reset.
I’d expect that to flow through to their agency roster as well, so M&C, the Greenhouse and Wellcom should all be on alert.
If they’re not worried, they should be!
We’re all really disappointed with this outcome and the ongoing poor decisions from Woolworths leadership — it just doesn’t make any sense.
Why?
Seems like a sound and much needed appointment.
It’s not been a good couple of years for international c-suites across a number of sectors to try to reshape brands without local knowledge/understanding of the Australian market. Will be interesting to see how this play out…
That CV suggests Sean is the perfect person to sort the mess out.Big retail food brand experience in a big competitive market surely eclipses any thing an internal candidate could offer.
Clean and well stocked stores would be a smart move to increase sales and market share.