PepsiCo announced a new North America business unit – Multicultural Business and Equity Development Organization – dedicated to addressing inequalities for historically excluded people and underserved businesses and communities. PepsiCo appointed Derek Lewis, a 34-year PepsiCo veteran, as its first-ever President of Multicultural Business and Equity Development. In this new role based in Orlando, Lewis moves beyond the beverage business to lead a new organization that leverages the combined scale and influence of PepsiCo food and beverage to address business inequalities and maximize overall results and impact.
The new business unit will operate across PepsiCo’s North America food and beverage businesses as a one-team approach to drive sustained change at a faster scale across PepsiCo Beverages and Frito-Lay. Lewis will report to Kirk Tanner, PepsiCo Beverages North America CEO and Steven Williams, PepsiCo Foods North America CEO.
“To take the next step in its Racial Equality Journey, PepsiCo is calling on one of its top executives to lead an organization embedded in the company’s two largest businesses with a focus on providing new educational opportunities, building up small businesses and creating rewarding job opportunities in an effort to support underserved businesses and communities,” said Kirk Tanner, CEO, PepsiCo Beverages North America. “This is a significant move, which we believe will increase engagement and impact internally with employees and externally with consumers and enable greater progress for the future.”
Lewis most recently served as President of PepsiCo Beverages North America’s South Division in Orlando and played a role in the company’s broader diversity and community engagement agenda, including leading the creation and expansion of Pepsi Stronger Together – PepsiCo’s series of grassroots initiatives bringing tailored programming support to communities across the country. In addition, Lewis oversaw the “She Got Now” internship program providing career opportunities for HBCU female students and the Historically Better Gala honoring Black trailblazers.
“Leveraging this new team across PepsiCo’s beverage and convenient foods businesses will allow us to more quickly scale this important work in communities across North America,” said Steven Williams, CEO, PepsiCo Foods North America. “We take great pride in the strength of our teams, the power of our brands, and our ability to exceed consumer and retailer expectations. Incorporating and accelerating our equality agenda will now be a new area of strength as we create sustained change in the communities where we live and work.”
The Multicultural Business and Equity Development Organization is a critical next step in PepsiCo’s broader Racial Equality Journey efforts announced in 2020, which are centered around a commitment to invest more than $570 million over five years to lift up Black and Hispanic communities and increase Black and Hispanic representation, leverage the company’s scale and influence across suppliers and strategic partners, and help address systemic barriers and create economic opportunities for Black and Hispanic Americans. Additionally, a strong focus will be placed on gender equity, as well.
Specific focus areas of the organization will include:
BUSINESS FOCUS
- Accelerating retailer business development in multicultural communities
- Expanding existing successful programing, including Pepsi Dig In, Black Restaurant Accelerator Program and Juntos Crecemos – all aimed at supporting Black and Hispanic communities
- Leveraging the scale of PepsiCo to drive investment in and support of diverse suppliers and partners
- Elevating consumer awareness and sales with key multicultural cohorts across the company’s beverage and convenient foods portfolios
- Amplify brand activations to drive distinction across beverages and convenient foods through programs that provide a sense of community and purpose
EQUITY FOCUS
- Rebranding and national expansion of the successful Pepsi Stronger Together community engagement program to work across the food and beverage businesses and increase scale and awareness across North America
- Elevating PepsiCo’s efforts to be an employer of choice for diverse cohorts
- Supporting the company’s employee resource groups to build a unified company that celebrates and thrives on the diversity of each employee
- Enhancing the company’s engagement to empower and invigorate its associates that make, move, and sell PepsiCo products
