Watch this space

Jorge Lopes is giving little away in his first press interview since taking over at the helm of Diageo NI. But he comes to Belfast with an impressive track record and a focus on further improving the drinks giant’s relationships with its customers…

While Jorge Lopes might confess that he has found his first few weeks in his new post as country director NI for drinks giant, Diageo, to be “relatively easy”, it soon becomes clear that he has in no way underestimated the challenge of the task that lies ahead of him.

Jorge – a Brazilian by birth – comes to the job from Diageo’s Irish office, where he was customer marketing director. His predecessor in Belfast, Michael McCann, has moved on to a new position as general manager Guinness Continental Europe with Diageo after 26 years with the firm in Northern Ireland.

Although Jorge has been ‘transitioning’ into his new role for the last three months or so, he has been full-time in Belfast since around mid-March, during which time he has been on the ground learning about the systems that are in place and meeting the trade face-to-face.

And his interview with this magazine was the first time that he has spoken to the press since arriving in Northern Ireland.

He was relaxed and happy to talk at length about his impressions of Diageo’s activities in Northern Ireland. He outlined clearly where he saw the most pressing challenges for the group locally and although he confirmed that he had already begun to lay plans for its future development, he could not be drawn on any of the detail.

Jorge Lopes comes to Northern Ireland with impressive industry credentials. Before he arrived at Diageo in 2011, he had worked for six years with the multinational consumer goods company, Reckitt Benckiser, eventually becoming its global customer marketing director. And before that, he spent three years with the management consultancy firm, McKinsey and Co.

He feels that one of the most obvious benefits that flow from a change such as this at senior management level is the fresh perspective that new eyes can bring:

“That means an opportunity to look at everything that we do from a new angle,” he tells LCN. “I also think that personally, I can bring a strong marketing and consumer perspective to this role and I see myself focusing a lot on that.”

Using that approach, Jorge says he hopes to foster increasingly close relationships with trade customers – a task which may well be made easier for him by the experienced he gained working closely with major retail brands such as Wal-Mart and Tesco.

It’s a continuous process, Jorge adds, and 10 per cent of his time is spent in the trade. He says that this is essential in order to connect with customers and gauge the state of the local market, assess competitors and decide how best to develop the business effectively.

“I think that innovation has a big role to play in Ireland both in the on-trade and in take-home,” he goes on. “We have products such as Smithwicks Pale Ale and Smirnoff Gold which are primarily for the on-trade, and in the take home trade we have Parrot Bay, Bailey’s Chocolat and many more. We have a really rich and exciting portfolio of products coming to market now and I am confident that will drive growth for us and our customers. Smirnoff Gold has already proved very successful in GB and I don’t think there is any question that it will be huge in Northern Ireland as well.”

Jorge does make it clear that while change is likely in the longer term, the more immediate objective is to leverage the assets that Diageo already has:

“We have just come through a period of reorganisation in Northern Ireland and there are no plans for any more of that. With these structural changes behind us, we want to be sure that we’re making the best of the assets that we have in place now,” he remarks. “I’m a very optimistic person by nature – I always look on the Harp side – and you can see the green shoots, you can see the recovery starting. Obviously, we aren’t out of trouble yet but it is better than it was three or four years ago, there’s a certain positivity in the air and we want to encourage that.”

One area where that is likely to manifest itself is increased on-trade engagement – more activity designed to draw people into the pubs. That’s the primary purpose of the Guinness app which was launched last year and which rewards consumers once they are in the venue.

But Diageo also has a policy of collaborating with the trade during those high profile events that it knows will be tourist magnets. This helps to ensure that the hospitality industry is ready to get the most from each event and that the experience offered to consumers is everything that they would expect. That partnership approach will be evident again this year at events such as The Giro d’Italia, The Great Ulster Pub Week, The City of Derry Jazz and Big Band Festival and the Clipper Round the World Yacht Race.

“I don’t think that there is any company in this market that does as much as we do to bring more people into the pubs,” adds Jorge. “And we want to do more of that. We know that if we are going to have a good business then we have to have healthy customer relationships and so we value our links with the trade here in Northern Ireland.”

As for taking over at Diageo from Michael McCann, who was very highly regarded in the trade here, Jorge concedes that these are “big shoes to fill”:

“There’s no question about that because of his knowledge of the business and the relationships he developed,” he adds. “I don’t think that I could ever be like him, but I have to focus on the things that I can bring to the table which are a greater focus on the consumer and on developing stronger customer relationships.”

In terms of the future, Jorge indicates that he would like to see the company and the number of customers it serves increase and while he does have a strategy for those objectives, he says, he is unwilling to reveal any more at this stage:

“Whenever I look at Northern Ireland, I see a lot of opportunity but I can’t say too much about that just at the moment, so you have to watch this space,” he adds.

Jorge has moved to Belfast and now lives there permanently with his wife, Lucy, and their three daughters, Abigail, Sophia and Olivia.