Walmart Shakeup

Following up on our initial post from last September.

Dijuana Lewis was recently named SVP healthcare solutions at Walmart. She will report to John Agwunobi who serves as president of Walmart’s health and wellness business unit. Lewis most recently served as president and CEO of health benefits company Wellpoint’s comprehensive health solutions business unit but was dismissed from the company last fall after a senior leadership shakeup. She spent 16 years with Wellpoint and that background and insight should prove valuable at Walmart where she is expected to oversee development of products and services in collaboration with a third-party payer in the healthcare industry. (http://knowsource.com/2010/12/wellpoints-management-shuffle)

Walmart’s health and wellness division did not escape the company’s recent reorganization of its merchandising organization and leadership.

The company began to make some changes in the second quarter to serve its customers better after experiencing flat sales and negative comps in the U.S. for the second quarter of 2010.

Walmart’s changes included naming Duncan MacNaughton executive vice president of consumables, health and wellness, and Walmart.com, as part of a reorganization of its merchandising organization and leadership.

MacNaughton joined the company about a year ago as chief merchandising office for Walmart Canada after leaving Supervalu Inc., where he was executive vice president of merchandising and marketing. With more than 25 years of experience in retail and consumer packaged goods, MacNaughton also has held leadership roles at Kraft Foods Inc., H.E. Butt Grocery Co. and Albertson’s Inc.

Walmart also realigned the team within MacNaughton’s oversight. Scott Huff was named senior vice president of consumables. Also, John Agwunobi serves as president and senior president of health and wellness, and Scott McCall is senior vice president of health and wellness merchandising, reporting to Agwunobi. Senior vice president Steve Nave takes over Walmart.com. In addition, Phillip Freehling has been appointed senior director of planning, pricing and modular development for MacNaughton’s group.

It will be interesting to see if Duncan MacNaughton will change the operating strategy for the group. Walmart has been operating under the philosophy that healthcare products and services should be priced as commodities. (Health Affairs, September/October 2009).

However, Walmart also stated that “not everything in our health care system can or should be sourced, supplied, or priced as if it were a commodity (for example, high-risk medical procedures, complex diagnostics, and specialty pharmaceuticals).”