Doug Bagley to leave Diageo amid sweeping changes to global travel retail structure; Dayalan Nayager takes top role

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Doug Bagley: The highly regarded executive is staying in Singapore for family reasons and leaving Diageo

Doug Bagley, the much-respected Managing Director of Diageo Global Travel & Middle East (GTME), is leaving the company amid a sweeping reshuffle of the drinks giant’s travel retail operations. He is being replaced by Dayalan Nayager, currently Regional Director GTME Europe.

Under proposals still subject to a period of final evaluation and employee consultation, the GTME structure is being broken up, with the domestic businesses of the Middle East and North African in future reporting into Diageo’s Turkish operation.

The Global Travel headquarters will return to London from Singapore by 1 January 2017, a move which the company believes will offer closer proximity to key Europe-based global customers.

For family education reasons and as a direct result of the changes, Bagley has decided to not move with the business and as a result will leave the company. The Australian, held in particularly high regard by leading travel retailers, joined Diageo in 2009 as General Manager of the company’s China business, transforming a declining business back into growth. He then moved to Australia as Commercial Director, driving two consecutive years of growth, before being named Chief Commercial Officer for Asia, creating the commercial strategy for the region.

DayalanIn an internal note, Diageo President – Latin America & Caribbean and Global Travel Alberto Gavazzi thanked Bagley for his contribution and said: “During Doug’s time with GTME he transformed the travel retail business to a market leadership position through consistently achieving record levels of market share, built solid relationships with key external stakeholders and customers, and step-changed the executional delivery of the business.”

In a separate communique to travel retailers Gavazzi said: “We recognise that there has been a lot of change within Diageo GTME over the past few years; however, we believe that the proposed changes will be beneficial to and improve both our businesses.”

Before joining Diageo, Nayager was Commercial Director at South African drinks company Brandhouse Beverages from July 2014, having joined the company in March 2013.

COMMENT: As Gavazzi notes, Doug Bagley did an outstanding job heading Diageo’s key travel retail business, in particular driving improved top-level relationships with travel retailers as well as a strong innovation programme – both in product and promotion terms. One hopes that this committed and astute executive will not be lost to the travel retail channel for long.

The travel retail division’s move to London is a return to its European roots. When the company (then United Distillers) first established a global travel retail division under the late Phil Cushway in the 1990s, it was based in Hammersmith, West London, before relocating to Hamburg for a period. A return to London followed before the decision was taken to base the business in Singapore under Roland Abella in 2012.

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