A message from Group CEO, Arthur van Benthem

1 October 2024, 16.30

1 October, 2024, 

1 October 2024, 07:00

Dear Colleagues

 

Firstly, thank you for making me and members of the Inspired Pet Nutrition Executive Leadership Team (ELT) so welcome today. The openness you showed by asking so many questions is helping me to understand what is on your mind and what is a priority for us to focus on to provide you with answers as quickly as possible.

 

For those colleagues who were not able to attend either of our town halls today, I have prepared a welcome video to share some of the key messages with you.

 

Additionally, one of the messages I shared today was around how we plan on structuring the organisation. I know this has been something many of you have been keen to know, and I am now able to share some detail on this.

 

It is our plan to combine both organisations into a single company. This means we will not be running the two businesses independently. Combing our organisations allows us to share the knowledge and expertise within our colleague populations and it also enables us to give even better service to our customers.

 

I will be leading our combined organisation as CEO and I am delighted to confirm that Tim Watsham has agreed to transition into the role of Integration Director, reporting directly to me. Tim holds a wealth of knowledge about Butcher’s Pet Care and has expertise in growing businesses. These skills will prove invaluable as we combine our processes and ways of working into a single organisation. Tim will move into his new role with immediate effect.

 

As a result of combining our two organisations together;

  • Commercial will be led by Chief Commercial Officer, Fiona Fox. Director – Food for Dogs, Rachel Collinson and Director – Food for Cats, Ben Ford will report into Fiona.
  • Operations and Operating functions will be led by Chief Operating Officer, Anthony Stones. Operations Director, Mark Baggaley will report into Anthony. Any other colleagues who have reporting line changes as a result of this change have been spoken with today.
  • People will be led by Group People Director, Sophie Winspear. Head of HR, Sophie Mains, will report into Sophie.
  • Finance will be led by Group Finance and Corporate Development Director, Ross Lumsden. Interim Group Finance Controller Mick Milner and Head of Finance Business Partnering, Nitesh Modha will report into Ross.
  • Technical, Procurement and NPD will be led by Chief Technical and Strategic Partners Officer, James Lawson. James has spoken with some colleagues today, who will have a reporting line change because of this, and will speak to any other colleagues in the coming days.
  • Our team in Poland will continue to be led by General Manager, Julius Sammann, who will report into me.

 

Moving forward, Fiona, Anthony, Sophie, Ross and James and I will be known as the “Executive Leadership Team” (ELT). I will share more information on how we work and our ELT meeting structure in my next townhall. For now, I have attached an org chart including the areas that my team is responsible for.

 

In my note this morning I explained that we would be rolling out our colleague intranet for you. This will provide a useful tool to access information about Inspired Pet Nutrition and any changes to business processes and ways of working that you need to be aware of. This is now live and should appear as your default browser. You can also access it here: www.inspiredeveryday.online

 

On our colleague intranet you can;

  • watch my welcome video and view our organisational structure, as shared today – you can find it under “Colleague Communications”
  • read up to date FAQs, also under colleague communications, incorporating all questions we have received today
  • get to know the ELT a little better by reading their bios – you can find this under “Meet the ELT”

 

We will continue to update this at least weekly over the coming months.

 

To reiterate, we are incredibly excited to have you on board and look forward to taking the next step on the journey together. For now, it is essential that we stay focused and continue to deliver excellent service to our colleagues and customers.

 

Thank you for your continued dedication and professionalism during this period.

 

Best regards

 

Arthur

 

Sent on behalf of:

 

Arthur van Benthem

Chief Executive Officer

Dear Colleagues

 

We are thrilled to officially welcome you to Inspired Pet Nutrition.

 

Today marks an exciting new chapter as we begin our journey together. We recognise the wealth of talent, experience, and heritage that you bring, and we’re eager to see the great things we will accomplish. Together we are in a stronger position to service our customers and compete in the UK and European pet food market. Today is the start of our journey.

 

What to expect today:

  • Introductions: you’ll have the opportunity to meet some of Inspired Pet Nutrition’s leaders: Chief Operating Officer, Anthony Stones, Group Finance and Corporate Development Director, Ross Lumsden and Group People Director, Sophie Winspear, who are here in Crick with me today. Chief Commercial Officer, Fiona Fox and Chief Technical and Strategic Partners Officer James Lawson can not be here today – like many of you, they are attending PATS but Fiona will be popping across to the Butcher’s stand to introduce herself to the team there today.
  • Welcome gifts: please enjoy a cupcake whilst you read our welcome message. You’ll also see you have an Inspired Pet Nutrition lanyard for your security fob.
  • Screensavers: You will soon notice a new screensaver, which displays our combined family of pet food brands.
  • Answering the phone: from today, please answer the phone as “Inspired Pet Nutrition.”

 

What to expect over the next few weeks:

  • Email addresses: later this week, you will notice that your email address will change to Inspired Pet Nutrition. Don’t worry – any current emails will still be available to you when you login.
  • Signage: Over the next few weeks, you’ll notice that external Butcher’s signage is replaced with Inspired Pet Nutrition signage. It is important that our customers, colleagues and suppliers know that Butcher’s is now Inspired Pet Nutrition, so this is a keyway of helping with that. There are many photos and prints internally that showcase the family history and legacy of the Butcher’s business – these will be staying!
  • Colleague intranet: We are rolling out our colleague intranet for this will provide a useful tool to access information about Inspired Pet Nutrition and any changes to business processes and ways of working that you need to be aware of. This intranet will be your default homepage when you open your browser. You will notice that more and more content is added as we work through the integration plan. To not overload you with too much change, we will be phasing this over the next few months. We are working on preparing a plan to share with you as soon as possible. Let us know at colleaguecommunications@ipn.com if there’s anything that you think would make this work better for you.
  • Internal vacancies: one of the main benefits of acquisitions is the increase in career opportunities available to all colleagues that comes with being a part of a larger business. We will be moving to a single recruitment platform as part of the integration but in the meantime, we will be advertising all Group roles as well as IPN Kinmel, IPN Thirsk and Logistics roles on your existing recruitment platform. For central functions vacancies, we can be flexible in where these are located (at either our HQ in Thirsk or in the offices in Crick) as well as being able to offer blended working between home and the office. This is a little trickier with operational roles, given the requirement to be physically on site with our products.

 

Teams and ways of working: I know many of you are feeling uncertain about this change and what it means for you. I want to start providing answers to your questions as quickly as possible. As we move forward, we are committed to fostering an environment where you feel supported, empowered, and ready to succeed. Over the next few weeks, we will be spending time with colleagues to share more details on how our teams will work together and what you can expect in terms of systems and processes changes.

 

What isn’t changing:

  • Your fantastic products, Butcher’s, Blink and Classic, will continue to delight our customers.

 

I’ll be doing a face-to-face townhall today at 11am in the canteen. For colleagues in Poland or for those who are working from home today, I’ll also do a virtual townhall at 12.10 – look out for the invite that will be sent shortly.

 

We understand that any transition brings questions and we want to provide as much information as soon as we can. If you need anything, please don’t hesitate to reach out to your manager, your ELT member or you can ask questions (anonymously if you wish) on Slido.

 

We are incredibly excited to have you on board and look forward to taking the next step on the journey together. For now, it is essential that we stay focused and continue to deliver excellent service to our colleagues and customers.

 

Thank you for your continued dedication and professionalism during this period. Best regards

Arthur

Arthur van Benthem

Chief Executive Officer