Ms. Castonguay joined Saputo in February as deputy president and COO of Dairy Division (USA). Earlier, she was COO and executive vice president of operations, supply chain/logistics, new store and customer experience at Sobeys. She also worked as chief marketing and merchandising officer at Sobeys. Prior to Sobeys she spent 14 years at The Home Depot in a variety of roles, including business unit lead and senior vice president of home services and acquired businesses. She also has worked at GE and RONA.
She received a bachelor’s degree in business administration at Universite de Moncton and attended Emory University — Goizueta Business School and Harvard Business School.
Saputo also announced that Leanne Cutts has been named president and COO of International and Europe, effective Sept. 20. Prior to Saputo she was chief marketing officer at HSBC and earlier spent nearly six years at Mondelez in a variety of roles, including president of gum, candy and beverages for Asia Pacific, Middle East & Africa, and president and managing director of Mondelez Japan.
In addition to the personnel announcements, Saputo announced it has opened its new fluid milk and dairy alternative beverage facility in Port Coquitlam. The facility opening is part of an accelerating product innovation pillar at the company, Kai Bockmann, president and COO of the International Sector, said during a Nov. 4 conference call with analysts to discuss second-quarter financials.
“On the dairy alternatives front, we are well on our way,” Mr. Bockmann said. “With the acquisition of UK-based Bute Island Foods, we’re confident we have a great product that has been very well received by our North American foodservice partners during the trial phase. We are working on converting this success into sales on a global scale, including in North America and Australia. We continue to see a long runway for growth in dairy alternative cheese. We anticipate incredibly strong demand here, and we believe this will be a significant growth driver for Saputo.
“For dairy alternative beverages, we are focused on supporting existing players through private label and co-packing arrangements. We currently have two facilities in the US that have taken on additional volumes in the second quarter, and we have just added more capacity with the opening of our Port Coquitlam facility in Canada. When we look at the next pillar, which is to increase the value of our ingredients portfolio, we have some interesting progress to share as well. Since the acquisition of the resource facility, we have begun materializing on our ingredient strategy to enhance our portfolio in the US and internationally to move up the value chain.”
