ST. LOUIS -- A full six months into his role overseeing the convenience channel for Anheuser-Busch InBev, Manny Zayas is finding his experience in another beverage segment paying off.
Zayas, who took on the role of vice president of the beer-maker's new small format (convenience, drug and dollar stores) division this past summer, has spent these inaugural months meeting retailers and sharing data to help sell more products, both beer and otherwise.
"I see my role as much about helping my customers grow as much as it is about me helping to get resources from within my company to show them the value of convenience," he told CSP Daily News in an exclusive interview. "The more we can do for the overall health of the industry and how we help drive sales for the category--and potentially across other categories, be it snacks or other things that a chain is trying to accomplish--that puts us in that much better position to help them succeed so that we succeed together."
Zayas brings this attitude over from his previous employer PepsiCo, where he sees several parallels with the beer industry.
"Both operate as a three-tier [delivery] system," he said. "The packaging and how they go to mark through DSD [is very similar]. So, many of the challenges are practically interchangeable. So this position is something that really built on what I was doing."
Zayas' hiring at A-B was part of major overhaul of the St. Louis company's national retail sales (NRS) team. An overhaul that included:
- Combining the convenience and drug channel into one division to be managed by Zayas.
- Mass merchandise being added to the supermarket team led by Mike Potthoff, vice president, large format (supermarkets and mass merchandise).
- A-B announcing that the independent and package liquor team would join the NRS department.
- Sanjiv Chhatwal being promoted to vice president trade marketing. Sanjiv joined A-B 18 years ago and has held various positions in the company's sales, marketing and international divisions. Most recently, he was senior director of independent and package liquor, working in the trade channel marketing department.
All the above positions report to Chris Williams, vice president of national retail sales.
Zayas said the new role is a perfect fit for him.
"I've spent a lot of time in sales roles, done some work internationally and spent a lot of time in category management and insights-type roles," he said. "I've worked in every trade channel throughout my experience. … This role is really perfect because it lets me go even deeper into an area where I've already spent a lot of time. I've probably spent more time in convenience than most of the other channels, so for me it's a real natural move."
And when asked what A-B's biggest challenge is, he goes back to the principle that what's difficult for retailers in general is what's difficult for A-B and the beer category.
"There's an industry challenge around traffic. It comes up every single day, and part of what keeps that so dynamic is the economy," he said. "We've got changes and shifts going on with unemployment, demographics, and all those things present us with a set of variables that we've all dealt with before, but there's always a new, unique combination of things that you have to deal with."
For Zayas, keeping an eye on consumer insights--and sharing those insights with retailers--is key to keeping A-B and its retailers ahead of the curve.
"There's a lot of people in this economy that are fighting for their business lives, and it's important that we defend that," he said. "While we're very fortunate as a company--we've got a very large market share--we look at it as a responsibility, certainly not as an entitlement, to have the business we do. And anything we can do to not only help the industry but to move forward, that's a great place to be."
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