Leadership Transition
The Hershey Company (NYSE: HSY) is installing a seasoned global beverage executive atop its international division, naming Amanda Almond President, International, effective Oct. 12. Almond succeeds Rohit Grover, who spent 27 years at Hershey — eight of them leading the international business — and steps aside as the $11.7 billion snacks company pushes to expand its confection and salty-snack brands across roughly 65 countries.
Almond arrives from Vinarchy, the Bain Capital-backed global wine company, where she served as regional managing director for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, overseeing a portfolio spanning 57 markets. Before that, she spent 12 years at Bacardi in progressively senior regional leadership roles. Her résumé is built around premium consumer goods — categories where brand equity, channel relationships, and distributor management are the primary levers, skill sets that translate directly to Hershey's international go-to-market playbook.
Why the Hire Matters
For foodservice and retail operators sourcing Hershey's lineup — Reese's, Kit Kat, SkinnyPop, and the broader salty-snack and protein portfolio — the leadership change signals Hershey's intent to accelerate rather than consolidate its international presence. Kirk Tanner, president and CEO of The Hershey Company, emphasized Almond's track record of "scaling and growing businesses" across diverse markets, language that points to prioritizing distribution depth and new-channel penetration over near-term margin harvesting.
International remains a growth lever for Hershey at a moment when its domestic confection segment faces cocoa-cost headwinds and category softness in some discretionary snack channels. Expanding AUV contribution from international markets — particularly in EMEA and Asia-Pacific — could provide a meaningful offset as operators and retailers continue to navigate inflationary pressure on food and beverage supply chains.
What's Next
Almond will be based in Hershey's U.K. office and work alongside the International Leadership Team through the transition period. Her mandate, as framed by Tanner, is to bring Hershey's portfolio to "even more consumers" — implying both geographic white-space expansion and incremental channel gains in foodservice, convenience, and travel retail segments where confection and snack impulse purchases skew high.
Grover's exit, after nearly three decades, closes a chapter that saw Hershey build meaningful scale in markets from Brazil to India. The incoming president's Bacardi and Vinarchy background suggests familiarity with the premium-positioning and on-premise channel strategies that could inform how Hershey pursues new product and channel development globally. Almond holds a commerce degree from the University of Edinburgh and has completed advanced studies at Oxford and Harvard Business School.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
