Speakers
Lecturers
Dessislava Zheleva, FMCG Research Manager at GfK Bulgaria
Dessislava Zheleva graduated "Economics and sociology" from the University of National and World Economics in Sofia and "Law" from the University of Veliko Tarnovo. She has 13 years of experience in market research. Her work includes studies on new product and service development and launch; pricing; segmentation; consumer usage and attitudes; and brand positioning and repositioning, among others. In GfK she works as FMCG Research Manager.
Georgi Malchev, co-owner, Ilyan.com
Georgi Malchev has over 10 years experience in strategic marketing, business development and marketing - starting from the inception of the idea, through planning and execution, to running as a service, business line, brand and company. Throughout the years Georgi has been business consultant, manager, COO and board member to services and production companies. Georgi is partner and business development director at ilyan.com - a digital marketing agency. For the last 12 months the agency has created and executed digital campaigns for Danone, Kraft Foods Bulgaria, Zagorka, Henkel Bulgaria, Intersnacks Bulgaria, Maxxium etc. Georgi holds an MBA from AUBG. He teaches advertising, business communications and negotiations classes. He is a mentor at Eleven and Launchub - private equity funds for acceleration of start-ups.
Mark Yeomans, Partner with Ernst & Young EMEIA.
Mark specialises in the Consumer Goods Industry and has over 30years experience in consulting to clients in the retail, food, drinks, music and pharmaceuticals sector. He has worked in Asia Africa The Gulf and most European countries for many of the world’s largest brand names. Today Mark is on of the global team at Ernst & Young which studies consumer trends and seeks to find new services to support our clients. Based on his extensive experience he is one of several contributors to our recently published report Brand New Order which was launched by Mark and the team at the 2012 Consumer Goods Forum in Istanbul. Mark has an undergraduate degree from the University of London and post graduate qualifications from INSEAD, he is based at the London office of Ernst & Young.
Georgi Mandichev, researcher at Gfk
Georgi Mandichev is a researcher in GfK Bulgaria with working experience both in qualitative and quantitative market surveys. The field of his work requires broaden and deepen knowledge in various markets such as: FMCG, telecommunication and banking markets and social researches. At this moment, his projects are more and more depending of modern digital research methods, applied in the market research.
Currently, Georgi is involved as a PhD candidate in Sofia University. There his main interest is on Sociology of Media and Visual Anthropology. Georgi Mandichev is graduated with Bachelor Degree in Sociology from Sofia University "St.Climent Ohridski’ in 2008 and MA in Sociology and Social Anthropology from CEU, Budapest in 2010.
Dr. Rudolf Bretschneider, consultant and shareholder in GfK Austria
Dr. Rudolf Bretschneider is a consultant and a shareholder in GfK Austria. From 1973 to 2007 he was the manager of the company. Since 2004 he is a lecturer in media sciences in the Karl-Franzens-Universitat, Graz and since 1970 he is a lecturer in the Institute of Public Sciences and Communications of the University of Vienna. Rudolf has a doctoral degrees in Psychology and German Sciences from the University of Vienna.
Krassimira Raycheva, Senior Relationship Manager Visa Europe for Bulgaria
Krassimira Raycheva is the Senior Relationship Manager of Visa Europe for Bulgaria, in charge of the company’s business interests in the country. Her role is to promote the products and services of Visa Europe among the Bulgarian financial institutions. Krassimira is responsible for the company’s relations with the banks and other organisations working in the cashless payments sector. She is also responsible for implementing Visa Europe’s new and innovative methods of payments in Bulgaria, including contactless and mobile payments.
Krassimira has been working for Visa Europe since 2004. Before that she was managing various projects in the banking sector for IBM Bulgaria. She has experience in a commercial bank as the Head of the Cards Payments Department.
Krassimira holds a Master degree in Electronics from the Technical University – Sofia and a Master in Project Management from George Washington University. She also has a Diploma from Henley Management College.
Krassimira is fluent in English and Russian. She is married and has two sons.
Otilia Dornyei: Consumer Research Expert
Ms. Otilia Dornyei is one of the CEE new-generation professional market researchers. Ms. Dornyei has been working in Consumer researches for 16 years in Hungary and for 7 years in the Central and Eastern Europe within the GfK Group. Ms. Dornyei has worked with more than 70 Consumer and Retail companies answering with appropriate research solutions both strategic and tactical issues. Her professional focus lays on exploring the constantly changing behaviour of consumers during purchase decision making process and how marketing can influence this process. Ms. Dornyei was a guest speaker at inner GfK events, like the Research Summit, where she hold presentation in 2004 - London and 2010-Vienna, and since 2008 every semester at the New Comer Academy held in Vienna, Austria for training of new hires. She has been a guest lecturer for Marketing Sciences at the Budapest Economy College and at the Corvinus Economy University in Budapest. In 2011 she held a full day training course in Skopje, Macedonia on Consumer Behaviour.
Ms. Dornyei holds a University degree and graduated MBA 2010 on management studies.
Alexander Varov, NBD consultant for digital media and digital marketing
A leading expert with a key role in the development of the Bulgarian interactive advertising & web publishing market. Having extensive experience as a director or consultant for top companies in the market, such as Dir.bg, Mail.bg, Investor.bg. Darik Web, Atol Media, Imoti.net, Golden Pages, etc.
Hans Aage Joergensen, CEO of AHT Group
Hans Aage Joergensen, CEO of AHT Group since 2000, has a broad experience in the retail sector already over decades. Working in different senior management positions for well-known companies in the branch, Joergensen made the AHT Group a leader in its field in the last years with a sense for innovation and market-oriented developments.
For more than 25 years, the Austrian refrigeration and deep freeze specialist AHT Cooling Systems has successfully supplied the worldwide market with high-quality and reliable ready-to-use refrigerators and freezers for trade, business and gastronomy and has all well-known supermarket, discount and trade chains worldwide as its customers. At the company’s headquarters in Rottenmann, Austria as well as in the production plant in Changshu, PRC, around 1.100 employees manufacture more than 250,000 plug-in units each year, and the trend is increasing. More information about AHT – the "green" manufacturer, can be found at www.aht.at
Martina Steinberger-Voracek, Henkel CEE
Martina Steinberger-Voracek, graduated at University for Economic Affairs in Graz/Austria, is responsible for steering the Laundry & Home Care Sales and Distribution business of 32 CEE countries, including Central Asia Caucasus, since beginning of 2011. Besides regional Key Account Management, she is also in charge of regional Trade Marketing, Shopper Marketing and Customer Operations Management.
Martina joined the Henkel Laundry & Home Care Division in 1991. She started her career as Product Manager in Austria. Over the years she gained broad experience in Marketing, Category Management and Key Account Management through various positions. From 2004-2010 Martina was as General Manager responsible for the Austrian Laundry & Home Care business.
Julian Mihov, Senior Tax Manager
Julian has more than 15 years of experience in international tax structuring of inbound investments in Bulgaria, transaction tax support, business immigration, corporate, commercial and sport law.
Julian is a member of the EY EU Tax Law team, focusing on retail and consumer goods, real estate, and MET sectors.
Julian is a qualified Bulgarian lawyer.
Nadejda Dimitrova, Henkel Bulgaria
Nadejda Dimitrova joined Henkel Bulgaria at the end of 2002 and gained sound brand management knowledge, being responsible for nearly all brands during 5 years experience in Marketing department. In 2008 Nadia moved to the Key Account Management department, thus expanding her professional practice with responsibilities for the business development with key accounts, together with her responsibilities for Trade Marketing.
In the sphere of Trade & Shopper Marketing she manages the implementation in Bulgaria of the global Henkel Shopper Study project.
Jean-Jacques Dupas, president of the Axial Pacific
Jean-Jacques Dupas is president of the Axial Pacific Company, he founded in 1986, and he has a long experience of the international business and private label, since he started as import-export supervisor at Cuisinart, the number one food processor company in the USA in 1978, after he obtained his MBA from the IDRAC Paris School of Management. In 1980, he became vice president of his family group of companies, UNIFA, specialized in supplying private label biscuits and candies to French and European multiples. After the selling of his group to the LU biscuits company, now Kraft Foods, he founded the Axial Company, which rapidly became one major importer and distributor of private label food products in France and Western Europe.
Axial Pacific serves important retailers like the Carrefour Group (World n° 2 retailer), Casino Group, and Leclerc in France and southern Europe, Aldi and Lidl discount groups in Germany and the E.U., Wellcome group in Hong-Kong and mainland China. Since its creation, Axial Pacific has launched more than 600 different Private Label products in 26 countries, and has been PLMA French representative in France since 1987.
In 1994, Mr Dupas created the Pacific consulting company to help groups of manufacturers and retailers defining their Private Label policies, through specific market researches, in Europe and Hong-Kong. In 2005, both companies merged to create Axial Pacific, "all under one roof", Private Label from manufacturing and distributing, to consulting". Mr Dupas has been giving lectures and trainings in many countries (Denmark, Korea, Turkey, The Netherlands and France) based on his solid expertise, today he is proud to be sharing his knowledge to major Private Label deciders.
Kiril Bachvarov, head of Service and customer satisfaction, UniCredit Bulbank
Kiril Bachvarov is head of Service and customer satisfaction at UniCredit Bulbank. He has been working in the filed of marketing and advertising in the past 15 years and in financial products and services, in particular – in the past eight. He is in charge of the marketing communications of the bank, customer satisfaction with the services and dealing with customer complaints. He has a degree from the American University in Bulgaria and currently completes Global Executive MBA in SDA Bocconi.
Gordon Cesareo, Creative director, Design Board
Gordon Cesareo is Creative director at Design Board, leading European brand and packaging design consultancy. Gordon has wide expertise in strategic design, brand vision and brand positioning. He has studied "Typographic Design" at London College of Printing.
Over the years Gordon has gathered extensive international experience while working in the largest design capitals of the world – London, Tokyo, Milan. Since February 2010 he is part of the Design Board team and currently manages branding projects for P&G, The Coca-Cola Company, Kraft Foods, Tchibo, Bacardi-Martini and many others. Gordon is the main driving force behind the creative and innovative solutions for products such as Ariel and Lenor globally in the agency's longstanding partnership with P&G. Except being one of the most important Design Board team members in field of strategic design, he is often invited as moderator of workshops for our clients and lecturer at conferences and events for packaging design and strategic branding.
At Retail in Detail 2012 Gordon will talk about the role of design during a recession andthe impact of price-value strategies on visual brand communication or how brands fight to retain consumer loyalty and remain true to their promise.
Martin Miliev, Project Manager, Perceptica Media Research
Mr. Miliev occupies the position of Project Manager of Perceptica Media Research, the media evaluation arm of AII Data Processing, since 2011. Before that he had worked as a brand and marketing consultant at Transformity, part of Publicis Bulgaria, and as a media analyst at Commetric, running researches on media evaluation of firms like BEA Systems, adidas, HSBC, Deloitte and Hewlett-Packard. He has a Bachelor of Arts degree in International Business and Economics from Western Washington University and MBA from The University of Tampa.
Vassil Mirchev, creator and chair of the Board of directors of "VM Finance Group"
Vassil Mirchev created "VM Finance Group" and is chair of the Board of directors of "VM Finance Group". He has more than 20 years of entrepreneurial experience in establishing the companies of "VM Finance Group".
He has a degree from the National sports academy and a degree in international business relations from the University of national and world economy.
He is chair of the Bulgarian canoe-kayak federation.
Denitsa Pinteva, marketing manager for Bulgaria, Ficosota Syntez
Denitsa Pinteva has a vast experience in the production of FMCG. She has held various positions in Procter & Gamble -- she was responsible for business development, she was an account manager for beauty products and key account manager for the retail chains Carrefour and Billa. In 2011 she joined "Ficosota Syntez" - first as a brand manager and later as a marketing manager for Bulgaria. Currently she is responsible for brand and category development and prepares analysis and strategies. Denitsa has a business administration degree from the American University in Bulgaria.
Boris Smolyanov, Manager/Attornye-at-law, Ernst&Young Law Partnership
Boris Smolyanov is Manager at "Ernst & Young Law Partnership" with over 8 years of experience in providing all-round legal services to wide range of clients operating on the Bulgarian market. His practice in the field of legal regulation of the competitive market relations includes advice on unfair competition, mergers, abuse of dominant position or a monopoly, concessions and public procurement. In the retail business, Boris was involved in structuring the distribution chains, different methods of selling goods, promotional and advertising campaigns, protection against prohibited agreements. Boris is a lawyer registered in the Sofia Bar Association.
Vaios Dimoragas, executive director of Nielsen Bulgaria
Vaios Dimoragas is the Market Leader of Nielsen Bulgaria since the beginning of this year. He has a broad experience in both sides of market research (B2B and
in-manufacturer research management) and in multiple fields (Customized Market Research, Retail Audit and Pharmaceutical Audit). He has a wide market knowledge of both the FMCG and the pharmaceutical sector.
He started his career in 2003 at a Greek consumer research agency, before joining Nielsen as a Client Executive (2004). After that he moved to the pharmaceutical sector as Market Research Manager for AstraZeneca Greece (2006), before returning to Nielsen to serve the position of Group Account Manager (2010). He has a bachelor's degree in literature and a master's degree in consumer psychology. In his spare time he's interested in basketball and music. He is married, with two young daughters and he has relocated with his family in Sofia.
Hristina Dantcheva, a Principal with Charles River Associates
Hristina Dantcheva, a Principal with Charles River Associates (CRA) has more than ten years of consulting experience in a wide range of antitrust issues.CRA is a leading global consulting firm that offers economic, financial, and business management expertise to major law firms, corporations, accounting firms, and governments around the world. Hristina has been involved in the preparation of economic analyses and general advice to clients in numerous merger investigations and other competition-related cases before EU and national competition authorities in Europe, USA and South Africa. Her more recent engagements have included economic advice to BSkyB in their appeal of the 2010 Ofcom Pay-TV Decision in front of the UK Competition Appeal Tribunal; advice to interveners in Microsoft’s appeal of the EC abuse of dominance decision; calculation of damages due to anticompetitive behaviour in the chemical shipping sector; regulatory advice on access pricing in the broadcasting market; as well as estimation of competitive effects in supermarket, pharmaceutical, and telecommunications mergers. Hristina has a Master’s degree in Economics from the University of Oxford and a Post-Graduate Diploma in EC Competition Law from King’s College, University of London.
John Ryan, Stores Editor in Retail Week
John Ryan is a retail design journalist, commentator and consultant - an occupation he has followed for more than a decade. Currently he is Stores editor of Retail Week and Drapers in the UK, European editor for American retail design magazine VMSD as well as being a contributor to many other publications. He is also a speaker at conferences across the world and has spoken from platforms in Chile, Mexico, Brazil, Germany, Italy, Norway, Denmark and the UK over the last 12 months. A retailer by trade, John worked for C&A for 13 years, as a buyer and marketer in Germany and the UK, prior to joining the ranks of those who write and talk about retailing rather than participate in it.
Dessislava Fessenko, Senior attorney with Pavlov & Partners Law Firm in cooperation with CMS Reich-Rohrwig Hainz
Dessislava Fessenko is a Senior attorney with Pavlov & Partners Law Firm in cooperation with CMS Reich-Rohrwig Hainz Rechtsanwälte GmbH, Vienna, and heads the competition law practice in Sofia. Dessislava has been advising clients on a wide spectrum of European Union and Bulgarian antitrust, merger control and State aid issues since 2006 in Brussels and Sofia. Her experience includes cartel investigations before the European Commission, appeals in antitrust and State aid cases before the European Union Courts, merger filings and investigations before the Bulgarian Commission for Protection of Competition, referral of merger cases for review by the European Commission, among others. In the retail sector, Dessislava has been involved in antitrust investigations, antitrust audits, structuring of distribution systems and promotion arrangements. Dessislava is a Bulgaria-qualified attorney-at-law and holds an LL.M degree in EU Business Law from the University of Amsterdam and post-graduate diplomas in EU competition law and Economics for competition law from King’s College, London.
Oliver Boucke, Research Director of ShopperTrak EMEA
Before joining ShopperTrak at his current position, Oliver worked within the retail research and consultancy team at CB Hillier Parker for 7 years. His responsibilities included retail property consultancy, retail database/geo-demographic system development and retail mix analyses for optimising shopping centre performance.
In June 1996, he joined the retail marketing consultancy, Business Blueprints Ltd, as Head of Research. He managed both retailer and consumer marketing research for various
shopping centre clients.
Having spent 18 months working for Footfall Ltd, Oliver moved on to be the Research Director of ShopperTrak RCT when it was established in January 2000.
At ShopperTrak, Oliver’s role is to deliver retail and consumer marketing research to the retail industry, with a particular focus on asset management research and performance
benchmarking services for shopping centre owners and managers, in addition to conversion rate measurement for the retail industry.
Darin Stankov - director "Antitrust and concentration" in the Competition Protection Commission (CPC)
He has a law degree from the University of Orleans and the Université Paris 12, France. He has a master's degree in European Law with a specialisation in EU competition law. He started his career in CPC in 2003 and later gained experience in the private sector in Bulgaria and abroad in companies such as Mobiltel and IBM. He returned to CPC in 2010. Since February 2001 he is the head of the "Antitrust and concentration" directorate.