(Bloomberg) — Diageo Plc Chief Executive Officer Debra Crew stepped down after a bruising run in which the company’s stock has plummeted.
The maker of Guinness and Johnnie Walker whisky said Wednesday Chief Financial Officer Nik Jhangiani had been appointed interim CEO, with a search already under way for Crew’s permanent replacement.
Shares of Diageo rose as much as 4.4%, the most since April. The stock had slumped 43% through Tuesday’s close since Crew took over in June 2023.
Her tenure has been punctuated by setbacks including a drop in sales on cooling demand in China and the US, and a profit warning after being caught out by piles of unsold inventory in Mexico and Brazil.
The company was forced to scrap its long-held medium-term sales target in February as a result of higher trade friction denting consumer confidence. Then in May, Diageo said it would cut costs by $500 million over three years across its supply chain, advertising and promotions and its operating model. The company has also been pursuing asset disposals.
Crew, 54, a former boss of tobacco company Reynolds American Inc, was promoted to the top job at Diageo a month early after the death of predecessor Ivan Menezes. She served in the US military before beginning a career in the consumer goods industry, working at PepsiCo Inc., Nestle SA and Mars Inc.
But she took the Diageo helm at a time when pushing drinkers toward more expensive spirits had become harder due to a post-pandemic cost-of-living crisis. More recently, US President Donald Trump’s tariff war has made operational challenges even tougher.
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