MILAN – Roland Weening (picture) was appointed President Coffee, Mondelez Europe and Global Category Lead Coffee for Mondelēz International in September 2013.
Coffee is a USD 4 billion coffee business in Europe and one of Mondelēz International’s five global categories.
Driven by a passion for building brands and businesses in a sustainable way, Roland joined Mondelēz International in 2011 as Global Vice President, Coffee, leading the strategy, marketing and innovation agenda for the category worldwide.
During his time in the role, Mondelēz International’s coffee business continued to expand both in Europe as well as globally, moving into markets such as the Netherlands and Australia for the first time.
Over the past two years, strategic platforms like Millicano (a premium convenient coffee containing a mix of freeze dried and whole-bean coffee) were strengthened and rolled out, Espresso capsules were developed and launched, and Tassimo, the single-serve multi-beverage platform, became the fastest growing single-serve system in Europe, in line with the target of becoming a one billion US-dollar brand.
In addition, Roland was behind the development and launch of Mondelēz International’s USD 200 million commitment to coffee, called “Coffee Made Happy”, which seeks to empower one million coffee farmers by the year 2020.
Prior to Mondelēz International, Roland worked for Unilever where he held a variety of sales, marketing and general management roles in his native Netherlands, as well as in Italy, Ireland and Poland. As Global Brand Director for the multinational’s ice-cream business, he was responsible for the successful repositioning and growth of the category under a new “Heartbrand” strategy.
This strategy reframed ice cream from an occasional treat for kids to everyday fun food for all, making ice cream relevant again for youth and turning the Heartbrand into a powerbrand with global, iconic appeal.
Immediately prior to joining Mondelēz International, he was Vice President Brand Development Savory Foods CEE & Russia for Unilever, based in Warsaw, Poland.
Roland holds an MBA in Marketing and Strategic Management from the University of Amsterdam and speaks English, German, Italian and French, in addition to his Dutch mother-tongue. Married with three sons, he lives in Zurich.
