After a year of sitting vacant, Anheuser-Busch inBev has finally filled its chief strategy officer role.
The world’s largest beer manufacturer announced Monday evening the appointment of Benoit Garbe as chief strategy officer, Bob Tallett, A-B’s VP of business and wholesaler development, wrote in a letter to the company’s wholesaler partners.
“Benoit brings a deep experience in our industry, having worked previously at Moet Hennessy and Diageo,” Tallett wrote. “In addition to his intimate knowledge of the U.S. market, Benoit brings a strong global perspective, having spent the last several years based in Shanghai.”
Garbe will join A-B’s management committee and will work with the company’s commercial leadership team, Tallett added. He fills the role vacated in November 2019 when Fabricio Zonzini took over as president of A-B’s beyond beer business unit.
“In filling this role, we focused on identifying an individual who brings additional and complementary experience and expertise to help us shape our strategy moving forward and further fuel our commercial momentum,” Tallett wrote. “We prioritized finding a person with knowledge of the North American market who shares our consumer-centric mindset and has a strong track record of driving a strategic vision to capture growth.”
Garbe brings more than two decades of marketing and strategy experience to the role, working in marketing and strategy roles at Converse, Diageo and Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton. He also has consulted in a variety of industries for HP, the Mayo Clinic, PepsiCo, P&G, Gucci, Vodafone, Huawei, Hair, AXA, VF Corp, Intel, Marriott and A-B InBev.
“My goal is to inspire and transform businesses, making them more digitally powered, creatively inspired, and purpose driven,” Garbe wrote on LinkedIn. “I believe that higher purpose and human insights are the new catalysts for business growth, inspiring employees, touching consumers, and building stronger communities.”