It has been announced that former Tennent Caledonian Breweries’ (TCB) CEO Brian Calder has joined Inverarity Morton as a Non-Executive Director.
According to Inverarity Morton’s Managing Director, Stephen Russell, it was Calder’s background in drinks wholesaling and incisive business acumen that made him the top choice for the job.
Calder’s background includes joining Wallaces in 1975 and helping to build the then pub and retail business throughout Ayrshire before it moved into drinks wholesaling as Wallaces Express in the mid-1980s.
He was promoted to Managing Director of Wallaces in 2000, which came shortly before the business exited pubs and shops to focus on wholesaling. He staged a management buyout of the company with Chris Cosh in 2003, which was then sold to C&C in 2014. He stepped down as CEO a year later.
Stephen Russell explained the decision, “Brian is an incredibly astute businessman and knows the trade, knows the marketplace inside out.”
He continues, “He made a very bold, but canny, decision to completely reshape the company [Wallaces Express] and then steered it over a relatively short time to become the most successful wholesaler in Scotland. At the time of the C&C acquisition, Wallaces had a turnover of £90m and employed over 300 people.”
Calder is being brought into Inverarity Morton to look at ways to improve the product offering and operational productivity at the company. Russell adds, “We have asked him to come in and conduct a full audit of the business, looking into every nook and cranny from the product range to systems and policies.”