Elise V

Consulting & advisory projects

Development of new growth pillar

Soulfresh is a founder run company, now reporting to a private equity board, following funding by private equity in 2019. The founder remains as CEO and major shareholders from the business operate as executive directors.

The business was established in 2013 and is now a $100M+ global business with the simple mission of “Disrupting Food For Good”.

Marketing Director (current fixed term contract).

Employed to lead a significant business transformation across all categories working with board and founder.

Leadership of strategic direction and P&L.

Development of business unit structure and ways of working.

Leadership of brand purpose, sustainability and impact strategies.

Leadership of marketing function, creative, branding and innovation strategy.

Strategy and Portfolio Consultant.

Development of total business 3 year growth strategy and business model optimisation for vegetarian portfolio.

Development of channel expansion strategy for alternative milk.

Branding consultation and new packaging design development.

Communications strategy.

Consult on the development of wellbeing strategy and leadership development.

WOBSX is a director-led peer support program developed as a partnership between Women on Boards (WOB) and Dan Liszka at HUBB Sydney.

Benny Button is a small business run by two founders making a big impact on large organisations in corporate wellbeing. Their clients include Victoria Police, UGL Energy, NSW Government, Kelloggs, REA Group, and Local Councils.

Development of business strategic direction.

Development of brand purpose and key foundational elements.

Implementation of business and marketing plan.

Client engagement (new and existing business).

Client and market research to inform new product/service development.

General Mills is an ~$18B (USD) global leader in food. The Australian business is part of the European cluster and the senior leadership team reports into the European based president.

Leading brands in Australia include Old El Paso, Latina Fresh, Hagen Daaz, Betty Crocker and Nature Valley.

Senior Leadership Team member (ANZ) report to VP

Matrix structure, alignment of strategy & resourcing into European Leadership Team

Head of business unit (Fresh Meals and Pasta), full accountability for creation of long term strategy, implementation of plan and delivery of full P&L. Oversight for cross functional team including multiple manufacturing sites & suppliers.

Marketing function co lead, responsible for coaching and mentoring marketing team, aligning structure to strategy and representing function on ANZ leadership team and Regional (Europe) Marketing team.

Strong track record of overdelivering on financial commitments across P&L.

Drove turnaround on Latina business resulting in strong growth, profit improvement & redefined portfolio strategy and strategic direction.

Lead brand to record share levels (70%).

Delivered significant improvements in employee engagement (68%-84% overall), particularly in marketing function; most significant improvement in “Inspired by my leaders”.

Sponsor of employee wellbeing program facilitating fitness and meditation classes, nutrition and wellness panellist resulting in strongest ever business engagement during COVID (WFH).

Drove strong improvements in business culture (as part of senior leadership team) resulting in “Great place to work” external certification; marketing team 94% rating across 17 questions.

Integrated Latina Business Unit into regional (Swiss based) matrix, driving strong alignment to long term strategy and built strong cross functional relationships.

Lead total marketing team on implementation of General Mills “Brand Champions” way of brand building, coaching team to develop 3 year strategic direction for all brands.

Led development of Latina Brand Purpose and resulting communications idea and execution.

Led renovation on Latina Meals, overdelivering profit objective by 50% whilst growing baselines ~25%.

Launched multiple new innovation platforms resulting in strong incremental penetration gains.

Led development of new consumer investment model for Latina; result was 3 times improvement on ROI over 2 years.

Grew Betty Crocker to #1 Baking Brand in Australia.

Drove significant margin improvement, introducing end-to-end innovation in business model from plant to product.

Developed 3-year innovation pipeline resulting in strong incremental distribution growth.

Launched multiple ranges including Gluten Free range, Christmas range, Café Series, Premium tier.