Nicky Hartery named as Musgrave chairman

Irish wholesale and retail company Musgrave, owner of the SuperValu and Centra brands, has appointed Nicky Hartery, a former executive of Dell and current chairman of CRH, as its chairman.

Mr Hartery will take over from Peter Lacy, who is to retire at the end of the year.

Mr Hartery, a graduate of UCC, has been a non-executive director of Musgrave Group since 2010 and has also worked with Kodak during his career.

Mr Hartery, chairman of the building materials giant CRH, has a background in supply chain management which would serve him well in the new role, said Musgrave chief executive Chris Martin.

“In his role as non-executive director, Nicky has already made a valuable contribution to the business and I know we will continue to benefit from his deep expertise, particularly in the area of supply chain,” said Mr Martin.

Mr Lacy has been a non-executive director of Musgrave Group since September 2006 and chairman since 2014. Before that, he was a partner at PwC for 25 years.

Musgrave has signalled in recent months that it is to “invest heavily” in online shopping as Irish shoppers adjust their grocery habits.

The Cork-founded wholesaler reported sales of €3.7bn for the 2016 financial year.

SuperValu had sales of €2.67bn for 2016, an increase of 2.4% over the previous year. Centra had sales of €1.59bn in 2016, a 3% increase on the previous year’s performance.

Mr Martin said in July: “What we saw last year is that our online grew by about 22%. So far this year, it has grown by around 24%. We’re investing heavily.”