Anthony Hemmerdinger, who has spent over two years as managing director of Telecoms at Sainsburys, has been confirmed as the new managing director of Greene King’s Local Pubs division.
Hemmerdinger, who also previously had a stint as retail and contact centres director at Carphone Warehouse, will oversee group’s c500-strong Local Pubs division, while Peter Blake, formerly managing director of Café Rouge, heads up its Destination division.
As revealed by M&C last month, Richard Lewis has been promoted from managing director of the group’s Destination Pubs & Restaurants division to oversee its entire Retail division, which incorporates its c1,050-strong managed operation.
Greene King has restructured its management team as it gears up to complete the £773m acquisition of Spirit Pub Company.
It is thought that Jonathan Webster current managing director of the company’s 900-strong tenanted and franchised arm, Pub Partners, will oversee the merger of the two companies.
The Competition and Markets Authority has said there are ‘reasonable grounds’ to think that Greene King’s offer to sell 16 pubs to address competition issues over its acquisition of Spirit will be accepted.
The CMA now has until 21 July to decide whether to further investigate the merger but Greene King has insisted it still expects to complete the acquisition by the end of June.
The completion of the Spirit deal will see the formation of a 3,127-strong pub company.
