Wildpack Beverage Inc., a leading middle market co-packer of canned goods announced that it has completed an operational leadership restructuring, appointed PGP Capital Advisors, LLC as financial advisor to the company, and that Rael Nurick has resigned from the Board of Directors.

Operational Leadership Restructuring

Wildpack has completed restructuring its operational leadership team to provide higher levels of manufacturing expertise and focus on business alignment. The changes include:

• Thomas Walker, Chief Growth Officer, has been promoted to running all day-to-day operations. He is focused on tactical business execution with an emphasis on aligning core business units with shared service divisions to achieve critical operational milestones. This enables the CEO to focus on overall company objectives, strategy, business prospects and building stakeholder value.
• Tom Ewing has been hired to lead our manufacturing division, having just completed his 100-day initial plan. He is a 30-year co-packing veteran who has worked for the largest beverage co-packers in the world with recent direct experience in both Wildpack’s size of operations, with successful experience scaling multiple co-pack facilities. He has been tasked with, and has already successfully completed rebuilding operational personnel teams and processes that can support the higher levels of utilization the Company is driving towards to achieve its operational targets.
• Dan Wales has been promoted to Vice President of Shared Services, having successfully structured a team as Wildpack’s Vice President of People and Culture. He is managing all divisions of Wildpack which support our core manufacturing and sales functions, allowing for a right-sized optimized management and personnel structure.
• Elijah Clare has been promoted to Vice President of Brokering as this division has continued to grow independently, as well as support our co-pack and decorating business segments. It has historically been managed under Shared Services, but with the continued upside of the division, Wildpack has moved it to be managed as a stand-alone core business unit.
• New plant managers at our co-packing sites, improved middle management restructuring across all operational divisions, and a high-powered product quality assurance team. This structure is a mirror of the successful beverage co-packers to which Mr. Ewing has built and led in the past.

“Emphasising our focus and leadership on core aspects of our business is exactly what Wildpack needs to continue turning and scaling our business, and moving Mr. Walker to lead day-to-day operations allows for this focus. Further, it will allow me to focus on my strengths around strategy, business prospects and stakeholder engagement” said Mitch Barnard, Chief Executive Officer.

Appointment of PGP Capital Advisors, LLC
Wildpack has engaged PGP to assist Management and the Board in assessing opportunities to maximise stakeholder value. The mandate is broad in nature and includes capital restructuring, financing, acquisitions, and dispositions. PGP has a strong track record of assisting mid-market growth businesses to unlock stakeholder value. The lead partner at PGP has worked with Wildpack since its inception with broad beverage experience at leading investment banks prior to joining PGP.

Resignation of Rael Nurick
The company and Mr. Nurick have mutually agreed that to avoid any potential conflicts it is in the best interest of Wildpack for him to resign from the Board of Directors. Sandton Capital Partners remains supportive of Wildpack as its main financing partner as it continues to grow and evolve.