Kenneth McGrath will take over as Vice President of Lidl International on October 1, 2021. The Schwarz Group announced this on Wednesday. McGrath will take over the company’s international business once current CEO Gerd Cherzanowski takes over the entire Schwartz Group.
The Schwarz Group is Germany’s largest food retail group, to which Kaufland also belongs. The power struggle has been raging at the top for weeks. President for a long time Klaus Gehrig had to leave the company abruptly a few weeks ago. He had previously clashed with Lidl boss Gerd Chrzanowski and later with Schwarz Group owner Dieter Schwartz. Chrzanowski should take up his role in the future. He did not know when the time would come.
MacGrath has been in international retail for more than two decades, including as President of Lidl Ireland between 2009 and 2013. The Schwartz Group press release praises his successes at that time. This was followed by the position of Managing Director for Central America and the Caribbean at Digital Digicel. He was most recently president of the American discount company Save-A-Lot.
