Greg Foran Named New Wal-Mart USA CEO

Wal-Mart, the world’s biggest retailer, has announced New Zealander Greg Foran as CEO of its US business, responsible for 4,700 stores and accounting for 60 percent of the company’s total global revenue of US$476b.

Foran, 53, has been a fast-rising executive at the retailer’s Asia operations. He was head of Walmart Asia, after being appointed CEO of Wal-Mart China in 2012. Foran will begin as U.S. CEO on Aug. 9, the Bentonville, Arkansas-based company said today in a statement.

Greg Foran has 30 years of retail experience in operations, merchandising and marketing. He started as a shelf-stacker in a Hamilton supermarket. He had a key operational role at The Warehouse in the 1990s, and then in Australia led Woolworth’s supermarket division and held other senior roles at the Sydney-based company, including GM of the Big W chain of discount stores and Dick Smiths.

He was educated at Hillcrest High School, Hamilton (Class of 1978), has a diploma in management from the New Zealand Institute of Management, and has studied executive education at Harvard University and the University of Virginia. The New Zealand Herald reports that Foran began his career packing supermarket shelves in Hamilton in the ’70s. Foran is the father of Kiwi Rugby League star Kieran Foran, who plays for the Manly Sea Eagles in the Australasian National Rugby League competition.

See Financial Times video interview with Greg Foran about Walmart’s Sam’s Clubs in China, three of which are the top-performing Sam’s Clubs in the world.

Coincidentally, the store manager at Mitre10 MEGA in Nelson, New Zealand is also Greg Foran.

Original story published on Bloomberg.