United Natural Foods Inc. (UNFI) announced actions it is taking to enhance profitability, speed decision-making and reduce administrative layers, primarily by consolidating from four operating regions to three. The three new regions will be called East, Central, and West. In total, the company will eliminate approximately 150 roles as part of this announced restructuring effort, primarily in management or supervisory positions.
In March, UNFI named Erin Horvath as chief operating officer and Louis Martin as president of wholesale to better align leadership teams and resources to drive the company’s customer-centric strategy and its four transformation initiatives, which aim to improve efficiency and enhance the customer and supplier experience. This geographic streamlining, across the entire organization, is expected to further help simplify the company’s structure and provide a more efficient model for supporting UNFI’s independent retailer and regional customer growth.
Sandy Douglas, UNFI CEO, said in the announcement: “These changes are a step in our transformation plan. The regional realignment will decrease layers of administrative management, increase leaders’ span of geographic responsibility, better align us to serve customers with less complexity, and support faster decision making. These changes are also intended to make our company more efficient and more profitable.”
The new East region will span from Maine to Florida and as far west as Tennessee. It will encompass 22 distribution centers and service more than 10,000 customers. It will be led by Kelly Sosa, region president, East.
The new Central region will cover the Mississippi River to the Rockies, comprising 21 states, 16 distribution centers, and approximately 9,000 customers. It will be led by Tandy Harvey, region president, Central.
The new West region will span 10 states, from Utah to Alaska. It will serve approximately 11,000 customers from 14 distribution centers and be led by Bob Garibaldi, region president, West.
Sosa, Harvey, and Garibaldi will continue to report to Steve Dietz, UNFI’s chief customer officer.
UNFI’s national accounts team will continue to be led by David Matthews and will support the company’s largest national retailers along with serving the growing needs of online and ecommerce retailers. Stacey Kravitz will also continue to lead UNFI Canada business. Both Matthews and Kravitz will continue to report to Martin.
