Guest Speaker

Dame Denise Lewis, British sports presenter and former Team GB track and field athlete

Dame Denise Lewis

Team GB Olympic gold medal winning heptathlete and British sports presenter

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Denise Lewis OBE is a retired Team GB track and field athlete, who specialised in the heptathlon. She won the gold medal in the heptathlon at the 2000 Sydney Olympics and bronze at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.Lewis first competed at the heptathlon in 1989 and achieved a best of 5277, two years before finishing fifth at the European Juniors in Thessaloniki.

Within the space of five years she was named the Commonwealth Champion after winning gold in Victoria, Canada, defeating her opponent by just eight points. This was arguably the breakthrough moment in Lewis’ career.

Two years later, she was the only British woman to win a medal from athletics at the Olympic Games in Atlanta. Her performances went from strength-to-strength and led her to a dramatic Olympic victory in Sydney in 2000.

Lewis is one of the ‘golden girls’ of British athletics having been inducted into the UK Athletics Hall of Fame in 2011 and twice been runner-up in BBC’s Sports Personality of the Year Awards in 1998 and 2000.

Lewis was honoured as Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2000 New Year Honours. Since retiring from athletics, she plays an active role in key areas including television and media work and is now a regular athletics pundit for BBC Television, including during London 2012 and Rio 2016.

TEAM GB

Speakers

Giles Hurley, Chief Executive Officer, Aldi UK and Ireland

Giles Hurley

Chief Executive Officer, Aldi UK and Ireland

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Giles studied History at Trinity College in Dublin and joined Aldi Ireland as an Area Manager in 2000. Giles was promoted to Trading Director for Aldi, Ireland in 2002.

Giles was further promoted to Group Buying Director, Ireland in 2007. He transferred to Aldi UK as Regional Managing Director in 2010 for the North West Region before returning back to Ireland in 2013 as Regional Managing Director of Southern Ireland.

Giles took up the position of Managing Director of Corporate Buying – UK & Ireland in 2014 and commenced the role of Group Managing Director in September 2015.

Giles Hurley began his current position of Chief Executive Officer, Aldi UK and Ireland in May 2018.

Niall O’Connor, Group Managing Director, Aldi UK and Ireland

Niall O’Connor

Group Managing Director, Aldi UK and Ireland

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Niall has held the role of Group Managing Director of Aldi UK and Ireland for three years, after taking up the position in late 2019. Niall has been a senior executive with Aldi for over 22 years and has held several roles across the business.

A native of Cork in Ireland, he was appointed Group Buying Director of Aldi Ireland in 2010, and prior to his current role, Niall worked as Managing Director of the Mitchelstown Region in Ireland.

Dan Ronald, Group Managing Director, Aldi UK

Dan Ronald

Group Managing Director, Aldi UK

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Dan joined Aldi as an Area Manager in 1998 and was promoted to Store Operations Director in 2002.

He then became Managing Director for the Neston Region in 2006, before moving to Managing Director of the Swindon Region in 2010. Dan took up his current role as Group Managing Director in 2015.

Julie Ashfield, Managing Director of National Buying, Aldi UK

Julie Ashfield

Managing Director of National Buying, Aldi UK

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Julie studied Psychology at Sheffield Hallam university and joined Aldi in January 1999 as an Area Manager.

She was promoted to the Buying Department in January 2003 as a Buying Director before progressing to the role of Group Buying Director role in April 2008. Julie began her current role as Managing Director of Corporate Buying in January 2017.

Jonathan Neale, Managing Director of National Buying, Aldi UK

Jonathan Neale

Managing Director of National Buying, Aldi UK

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Jonathan studied Accounting and Finance at the University of Warwick before joining Aldi as an Area Manager in January 2002.

He was promoted to the role of Property Director in February 2006, before joining the Buying Department as a Group Buying Director in February 2012.

Jonathan was the Managing Director of the Yorkshire Region between November 2014 and June 2015 before becoming Managing Director of Corporate Buying, which is his current position.

Belinda May Ball, Managing Director of Global Sourcing, ALDI SÜD Holding

Belinda May Ball

Managing Director of Global Sourcing, ALDI SÜD Holding

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Belinda studied History at the University of Exeter and joined ALDI as an Area Manager in 2008.

She was promoted to Store Operations Director for the Swindon Region in 2012 before progressing to the role of Group Buying Director of Corporate Buying UK in March 2016.

Belinda expatriated to the ALDI SÜD Holding in Salzburg as Group Buying Director of Global Sourcing in June 2019 and commenced her current position as Managing Director of Global Sourcing in December 2019.

Laura Conlon, Brand Director, Aldi UK

Laura Conlon

Brand Director, Aldi UK

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Laura and her team are responsible for the branding and design of all product packaging.

This includes design strategy, product rollout, management of the critical path for product launch and oversight of all Design Agencies.

Richard Davies , UK Retail Development Director, Smurfitt Kappa

Richard Davies

UK Retail Development Director, Smurfitt Kappa

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Richard and his team at Smurfit Kappa have been working with Aldi for the past 15 years on Shelf Ready Packaging.

Creating the Golden Rules for SRP and the artwork generation and management for each product.

Luke Emery, Buying Director - Plastics and Packaging, Aldi UK

Luke Emery

Buying Director - Plastics and Packaging, Aldi UK

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Luke and his team are responsible for driving Aldi's Packaging Sustainability strategy with the goal of making sustainability affordable for our customers.

This includes responsibility for Aldi's Plastics and Packaging pledges, including plastic removal, packaging removal, and use of recycled plastic content across the Aldi range.

Lawrence Flynn, National Supply Chain Director, Aldi UK

Lawrence Flynn

National Supply Chain Director, Aldi UK

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Lawrence and the Bardon team will be responsible for operating Aldi's most high-tech warehouse to date.

As part of this journey a detailed review of product packaging is being conducted to ensure its suitability with the automation that will be used at this site, and our next site in Bedford.

Claire Griffiths, Project Director, Aldi UK

Claire Griffiths

Project Director, Aldi UK

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Claire and her team are responsible for Project delivery in National Buying including our Business Transformation Project and the 2023 Supplier Conference.

Lewis Furlonger, Project Director, Aldi UK

Lewis Furlonger

Project Director, Aldi UK

Dawn Welham, Quality Assurance Director, Aldi UK

Dawn Welham

Quality Assurance Director,
Aldi UK

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Dawn is the Quality Assurance Director for Aldi GB & IE. Dawn brings a wealth of experience having worked in the Food Industry for over 30 years across Retail, Food Service and Regulatory roles.

Together, with her high calibre team, Dawn has responsibility for managing product and supplier approval processes for ALDI. Our QA team is known for driving business change and taking the complexity out of compliance whilst creating time and space for ALDI to continue to grow.

Michael Whitehead, National Supply Chain Director, Aldi UK

Michael Whitehead

National Supply Chain Director, Aldi UK

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Michael and his team are responsible for demand forecasting for our products across our full supply chain, along with reporting topic.

He is also responsible for the deployment of the new systems in our Supply Chain team.

Dan Gillett, Insight Manager, IGD

Dan Gillett

Insight Manager, IGD

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Dan has been a shopper insight manager at IGD for five years, focusing on big trends affecting shoppers as well as large format stores.

Prior to that, Dan held insight roles at dunnhumby and at a soft drinks manufacturer, having started out as a graduate buyer at Tesco in the Central European Hardlines team.

Guy Ousey,Head of Audience Engagement, IGD

Guy Ousey

Head of Audience Engagement, IGD

James Walton, Chief Economist, IGD

James Walton

Chief Economist, IGD

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James’ role at IGD is to help businesses anticipate and cope with strategic events, including: economic pressures, geo-political change, social developments and environmental stress.

James has worked with clients across the entire grocery industry as well as with non-industry groups such as government departments, financial businesses and NGOs. James is well known for speaking at both UK and international events and provides interviews for TV, radio and the press.

He also creates original reports and articles for IGD. James joined IGD in April 1999 and has served in several roles, becoming Chief Economist in 2004. Prior to joining IGD, he worked for Hillsdown Holdings, Northern Foods and Rank-Xerox.

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