Alison started her FMCG career on the front line, filling shelves as a merchandiser for Pepsi Cola in Rotorua.
Of the 7 executive teams that she has sat on over the years, on 5 of them she has been the only female executive. At Griffins they averaged 54% female representation at executive level over the period that she was CEO there - a statistic she is particularly proud of.
Despite having spent much of her executive years in marketing roles, she didn’t study marketing until she was in my late 20’s. She got a degree in political science in the UK when she left school and then decided to study marketing at Auckland University while working as a trade marketing manager for Cerebos Greggs in the 1990’s, which then kickstarted her career in marketing.