Nestlé changes its CEO. The Frenchman Laurent Freixe succeeds Mark Schneider. A rather brutal change.
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A few days ago, we learned of the ouster of Mark Schneider, who had been at the head of the food giant Nestlé for seven years. A real surprise. Having been relieved of his duties, he will therefore hand over, at the beginning of September, to Laurent Freixe, a 62-year-old Frenchman who knows the company well since he managed the Europe zone, then the Americas zone of the group, for many years.
With this appointment, the multinational of 270,000 employees intends to catch its breath after several months of turbulence. Nestlé is accused of selling overly sweet baby food in southern countries, the group is also indicted in the Buittoni contaminated pizza affair. It must also face a scandal surrounding its bottled water with suspicions of fraudulent drilling of some of its mineral waters and health problems around the Perrier, Contrex springs, etc.
In short, that’s a lot and it weakens Nestlé, while the brand has always sought to give itself an image of seriousness, concerned with the well-being of its consumers.
In addition, the sector is not very buoyant. Since three years, problems are piling up for the entire agri-food industry. Covid, the war in Ukraine and inflation have disrupted the markets and consumption is down. Nestlé is no exception to this decline: its internal growth, which was positive for a long time, has fallen sharply to become negative this year. As a result, investors have turned away and the group’s share price has lost 20% in five years.
Will this change of boss rhyme with a new strategy? Nestlé says in any case that it wants to return to basics: coffee, mineral water, chocolate and infant nutrition, the group’s flagship activities. Priority will be given to innovation to offer healthier products, the group assures. This is what is called “nutrisanté”, a cross between food and pharmacy.
To achieve this, Nestlé promises, for example, to reduce salt and calories in its products and to increase the nutritional value of foods, thanks to significant investments in research and development. A nice program, certainly, very attractive on paper. The fact remains that the challenge for Nestlé is above all to regain the trust of its customers and investors.