Cristina Marinucci (00:00)
think the say do gap is real, in snacking. We hear consumers talk a lot about, you know, and being more mindful. Also like sustainability, no one's going to say that's not important, but when that moment of purchase.

do see a gap sometimes in their actions

of some of those other priorities they talk a nice to have, but if it price, then it less of a priority in that decision hierarchy for them as well. those are kind of human no matter where we study

Jess Gaedeke (00:39)
Hi, everybody. Welcome to the Dig In podcast. I am really excited to be joined today by Christina Maranucci. She's VP Global Growth and Omni Commercial Insights.

which is quite a mouthful, which means it's a big job. And also the founder and co-host of the She Commerce podcast, which we're also gonna talk a lot about. So Christina, welcome. Thank you so much for joining today.

Cristina Marinucci (00:59)
you for inviting me, Jess. I'm excited to chat with you.

Jess Gaedeke (01:03)
OK, I'm going to throw an impromptu question out there for you. the most ridiculous thing you've bought online?

Cristina Marinucci (01:08)
Recently, I buy ridiculous things online all the time full disclosure. I'm a sucker for social commerce. So it was actually a revolving concealer brush. saw scrolling side, they had me at flawless, you know, finish in five seconds. And before my brain can intervene, I hit that buy now button and dons way to me as we speak.

Jess Gaedeke (01:19)
Hello?

Yeah.

Wow, okay, we'll have to report back, give us a assessment there.

Cristina Marinucci (01:36)
Yeah.

Jess Gaedeke (01:36)
Tell us a little bit about your background and your role today.

Cristina Marinucci (01:39)
All I've spent my career in FMCG and in different roles, right? I talk about the intersection of like insight, innovation and commerce across different parts of CPG, different parts of the world. But today I'm global VP of growth and on many commercial insights at Mondelez as you know, and my team is sitting really at the helm of, shopper and consumer insights, retail media.

and digital commerce. And we're really focused against one core mission, which is data and human understanding into actionable insights and growth decisions that are actually going to show up at shelf and online, right? Not just in theory. over the years, I've worked in various markets, categories, and done things from classic brand building and shopper consumer research to advanced analytics.

media and omni-channel strategy. But I the common thread is I gravitate towards the messy, right? The transformational problems where there's an opportunity to build something new, new capabilities, new frameworks, new ways of working, new ways of thinking are going to really transform organization.

Jess Gaedeke (02:52)
Let me just ask you question about that. Have you always sought out those messy, complex, thorny, hairy things or is that something that you kind of arrived at later in your career?

Cristina Marinucci (02:59)
Thank

As I reflect back, don't think I initially sought them out. think, you know, organically they came and I within them and really found that sweet spot between, you know, having to create something new, but really leverage the data and the insights and ⁓ kind of dig into.

what has happened and what has worked before and then what's possible. So I think once I experienced it, then yes, I did start seeking out. So like the mid, you know, career on for sure.

Jess Gaedeke (03:34)
Yeah, that's interesting. Well, speaking of digging in, let's do that. So we're going to move to a really rich story that I think personifies a lot of the experiences that you've described so far, Christina. So our listeners crave inspiration from other leaders and one of the best ways to inspire is to tell a story. And you've been a really influential leader in shaping how Mondelez approaches their global innovation strategy. So I'd love to dig into that. First, can you just talk to me about sort of the context of

how Mondalise thinks about local versus global innovation and sort of set the stage for us for how that's thought about today.

Cristina Marinucci (04:08)
Sure. snacking, think local context, especially for this category, matters a lot, right? Like taste, those rituals, sizes, price points, all that going to be very locally influenced. at the same time, I think you can still build a scalable pipeline, even if

every market is not reinventing the wheel. that's how we think about like freedom within a framework. Actually, at Mondelez we say local first, but not local only. global is defining those big bets and platforms, right? demand.

science that we have that's fueling this, helping to uncover those consumer tensions and the different brand we believe we can win over time. And then local is going to take that and translate it into what are those relevant products, the formats, the activations, the price points, the packages that make the most sense for their shoppers, channels and that local reality. So my job has been to help create that.

shared language and unified framework and build the toolkit so that, know, Brazil, India, the UK, the US, we're having 10 different conversations about innovation and what's driving growth and snacking. We're all kind of looking at the same consumer truths and portfolio logic. And then we're letting the markets kind of flex within that space.

Jess Gaedeke (05:27)
So how did you go about developing that are the people that were tackling this problem and what were some of the ways you approached it?

Cristina Marinucci (05:32)
Thank

Yeah, was a big undertaking. We've moved from the mindset of let's launch a new flavor to a system view of innovation. leaned into that core, is the demand right?

consumer understanding of the when, the why, with whom people are snacking and what problem they're solving in that moment. So the innovation briefs now from that lens, not from a technology or a factory line or we're filling a gap, so we're doing this, but really trying to push to that consumer problem to solve. then...

also to work more on big bet platforms instead of isolated launches. So we're investing more scalable platforms that can travel across brands, across markets, multiple years and not just be limited to these one-off SKUs that kind of fade out in year two. We've also, we're trying to build these continuous consumer learning loops, right? Using

a mix of different things, behavioral data, agile concept testing, in market experiments so that we're not waiting 18 plus months to learn, you know, whether or not something may work. I think that shift is really going from a more fragmented kind of project by project ad hoc innovation system to

a portfolio and a platform mindset that's going to be anchored in those consumer moments and that commercial kind of viability of those.

Jess Gaedeke (07:09)
Yeah, I love so much of what you just said because it really is a smart way to approach innovation. And I think there are still a lot of companies, especially in CPG, that just haven't quite cracked that code. They still operate very project by project. Sometimes we even just have to really remind them that, are we looking at incrementality here? Like that should be one of our KPIs right? So just really, it's inspiring to hear it being done well.

Cristina Marinucci (07:23)
Mm.

Yeah.

Jess Gaedeke (07:33)
And I'd love for you to just spend a moment about some of those consumer moments and those like, you know, real underlying needs and how you think about that global versus local. Because you made a good point. There's just some things that have to be learned and understood at the local level. But there's also probably some human truths when it comes to things like snacking, right? So I don't know. What are some of those like those consumer moments that you could share that that sort of personify what you've learned?

Cristina Marinucci (07:59)
Yeah, I think the say do gap is real, especially in snacking. We hear consumers talk a lot about, you know, and being more mindful. Also like sustainability, no one's going to say that's not important, but when that moment of purchase.

you know, we do see a gap sometimes in their actions where, especially in the wellbeing, I think everyone starts out the week, the day with the best intentions to be healthy. And then it kind of wanes throughout the day and by, you know, after and certainly after dinner, are way more flexible or open in their choices and maybe less rigid. And certainly as the week goes on too, as you're approaching the weekend, of that willpower will decline.

And in terms of some of those other priorities they talk a nice to have, but if it impacts the price, then it maybe becomes less of a priority in that decision hierarchy for them as well. those are kind of human truths, no matter where we study consumers and shopper behavior in any market.

Jess Gaedeke (09:02)
Bye.

Yeah, it's so At Digg, we say we have this belief that attitudes don't predict decisions. Like they're important to understand, but really it comes down to consumer choice and influencing those okay, so the global innovation strategy, it can't be an easy thing to pull off. You're making it sound like it's kind of flawlessly happening, but I'm sure that there are bumps in the road, right? Yeah, so, and this says something about my personality, but I love to hear like where you get tripped up. So share some of the, yeah, exactly.

Cristina Marinucci (09:24)
Yeah.

I mean, there's tension that is baked into the model and there are definitely real challenges to making that work. think, know, this my market is different fatigue. Every market is different. We know that. But if everyone is the exception, we lose all scale. So we need to get teams to genuinely use those shared frameworks rather than

PowerPoints or just populate hard work. Like they need to buy into this belief and it be ingrained in their how. think there's this tension between and alignment.

Right? guardrails are great until you're trying to hit an in-market key customer deadline and it feels a lot slower to bring everyone along. So that balance of governance with agility is a constant calibration.

I think a lot of companies struggle with data overload. We have more data than we know what to do with. And I would say not all data is decision grade, right? So the challenge is really focusing on right data and a few signals that matter and not drowning teams in dashboards and reporting and analysis paralysis, as we say.

So, then I think the probably one of the biggest challenges and we continue to struggle with this is culturally ideas early is tough and it's tough for everyone. think everyone loves to launch and everyone loves generating ideas. Fewer people like to say, Hey, this does, I made the bar. Like let's redirect those resources and that ruthless prioritization.

will result ultimately in us being able to focus on the bigger bets and repurposing those resources and that energy to the right places. none of this is fully self-designed. It is something we actively manage every day.

Jess Gaedeke (11:29)
I love the term ruthless prioritization and it is so important and we found again the companies that are getting the competitive advantage in market have learned how to do that well. They've learned how to kill the bad ideas early and really invest in the ones that are going to work. So I love that learning. How do you measure success for this type of program? Like what are some of the KPIs that you pay attention to?

Cristina Marinucci (11:40)
Sure.

Some of them are the typical business outcomes, contribution of innovation to incremental revenue and profit. looking at both brand incrementality and focusing more so now on category incrementality. We need to be growing the categories that we play in. rates and whether we're adding new buyers and or new occasions or just rather than just shifting share within the portfolio or the category.

portfolio health is important. So we need that mix of big bets versus line extensions. is the strength of those platforms across markets? that survival rate of innovations over time. Like we said, we don't want it to just burn out and after the first then I think with this new model, areas that we're starting to look at our speed and learning, right? That time from

insights to activation or insights to shelf, how quickly we're able to kind of, know, generate those ideas, test, learn and scale or stop. Right. And then the ways of working our markets actually adopting these shared frameworks. We talked about that earlier and tools. we seeing like

that cross market reuse of platforms instead of everyone starting from scratch. So for me, that real win is when I see a market that we maybe weren't directly working with, one of those frameworks or platform and apply it on their own. That's when you kind of know, okay, it's embedded. It's not just a PowerPoint or training or that transition from push from the center to pull from the markets is the real unlock.

Jess Gaedeke (13:28)
Yeah, that's a beautiful thing. Absolutely. And one of the other phrases used when you talked about some of those success metrics is survival rate of new products because so many of them don't last. And that is such a CPG like challenge. you know, I wonder maybe you and I can take this on in the industry. than thinking about it as survival rate, what about it's a thrive rate? It's like, how can we get more products to have that sustaining

Cristina Marinucci (13:52)
Love that.

Jess Gaedeke (13:53)
Okay, so we're going to get through not just

Cristina Marinucci (13:55)
Yeah, you don't want

to just survive. That's a really good point, right? You do want to, you should be building on the momentum from year one and what's next. I think once you shift from that idea of like a one-off a true platform, like an innovation platform that has multiple legs that can continue to reinvent itself and show up, you know, in different ways to serve those needs. Yeah. I mean, that's certainly thriving.

Jess Gaedeke (14:20)
Yeah, love that. So what's been your biggest takeaway from this experience of building and, you know, executing this global strategy?

Cristina Marinucci (14:28)
know, I think is less about ideas and just generating good ideas and more about the system design and the behavior change. think ideas were never short on ideas, right? That was never the constraint. was more about, we agree on what problem we're solving? You know, what is that consumer problem solve? How have we unlocked?

a real human truth, a deep insight that's gonna help solve for that. And we have in our case, shared ways of working to make decisions, but also who ultimately owns that decision? Because if we're waiting for 100 % agreement, we're not gonna move forward on anything. And then are we brave enough to say no to good ideas so that we can really...

double down on the great ones because yes, that's where we need to kind of pull those out from the average. And I think when you get that language, the incentives, the rituals right and how you prioritize, how you review that pipeline, how you celebrate the wins, how you the projects when you need to and make those tough choices, you unlock a very different level of innovation. And it's been

It's been a real learning journey for me and definitely a messy one. I'll say lots of, ⁓ yeah, I do. Exactly. ⁓ But it's certainly a team sport. So I think you can't go at it alone.

Jess Gaedeke (15:49)
You like the mess, right? That's what you said.

that's great. Well, thank you for sharing that perspective and that story. Let's move to your side hustle, which is pretty cool. So you just launched the She Commerce podcast. I've listened to both episodes. I'm super excited to see what's coming next. First, give us the pitch. What's the podcast all about?

Cristina Marinucci (16:15)
Yeah, SheCommerce is a podcast and a community that is built to empower women and women advocates in CPG and commerce. I co-host it with my fabulous Jackie Donowski. And the vibe is pretty simple. It's power women plus real talk. So we try to go beyond the buzzwords.

and everything is in bounds, everything from retail media and Omni-Commerce strategy to very real stuff like the work-life imbalance, the stereotypes, the of wage gaps. So every episode is designed to leave our viewers, listeners with something that's actionable and they can kind of use on that Monday morning, but also reminding you that you're not doing this alone.

So we're all about bold brands, fierce women, sister.

Jess Gaedeke (17:07)
Yeah, I love that tagline mentioned some of these grittier topics, but what are some of the things that you anticipate you'll be able to dig into?

Cristina Marinucci (17:15)
not as interested in those highlight reels, but we want to get into the real stuff. so topics we've discussed and have some plans for are definitely around money and power, pay to negotiate, equity, building wealth, not just titles, the only in the room, whatever that may look like, how that shows up in decision-making, in your confidence, and

know, avoiding the burnout there as well. career pivots, we've already gotten into some of that, know, failures, learnings, right? Getting restructured, leaving toxic cultures, realizing you might be in the wrong role and making bet on yourself. then certainly this balance or imbalance, like careers and caregiving, like what it actually looks like to lead teams, raise kids or care for a family.

ambitious without burning out. So less about those glossy empowerment slogans, more about the unfiltered realities of leadership and hopefully strategies that actually hold up in the real world.

Jess Gaedeke (18:20)
Yeah, definitely. Well, all those topics sound absolutely fascinating and important, I should say. One that I hope also comes up is related to as female leaders, I think because we are caregivers in our personal lives, we carry through so much of that caregiving to our professional world. And so I know I feel like I take on a lot of the emotional burden of my team and trying to find ways to do that healthily and

as I've grown, you know, to more seniority, how I can actually, I actually have to delegate even that emotional responsibility, right? That you can't sort of take it all on. So I wonder if that'll come up with any of your guests.

Cristina Marinucci (18:58)
sure it will. We will definitely touch on that in future episodes.

Jess Gaedeke (19:03)
Yeah. do you hope your listeners take away?

Cristina Marinucci (19:05)
Yeah, I mean, obviously just actionable takeaways they can use immediately in their day to day, right? In retail, e-commerce, Omni-channel. think clearer thinking in this fast changing retail landscape, right? Between retail media, growth, changing shopper behavior, know, what matters and what to do. Certainly stronger relationships without the burnout. So just as you were speaking to, like, what is that?

can build confidence, they build within themselves, within others and those harder moments. And then a real community, right? We want to build connections, mentors, a sisterhood, we talked about that, that you can actually lean on. And I think we're doing that with the honest conversations and hopefully with inspiration from women who are bold brands and leading with purpose.

probably the last big thing is permission to think bigger, right? Whether that's taking a risk, advocating for themselves, redefining what success could and should look like at them for this stage of their life. think if someone is listening and feels both seen and more equipped, we've done our job. if you've listened, at the end, we ask our guests to kind of take a and our

growing network of female leaders and advocates and pay it forward to amplify women's voices. So that's really what it's all about.

Jess Gaedeke (20:30)
I love it. I mean, there's so many inspiring things about And I consider myself part of the sisterhood. So thank you for getting me. Any lessons from first time launching a podcast?

Cristina Marinucci (20:35)
You are. Absolutely.

gosh, yes. Progress over perfection, right? If we'd waited until every element was flawless, we'd still be in planning mode, right? The fastest way to learn is just to jump in and start doing it. Be live, go live. I think having a sharp point of view is important. Two people that are just talking about marketing is not really a show. It's not entertainment, it doesn't have an angle. You need to have that clear lens.

who you're here for, what you'll talk about and what you won't. I think you need to treat this like a product, not a hobby. If you're going to take it seriously, you have to think about, you know, content distribution, the community, the partnerships, just like you would as if you're a brand. So kind of having that experience is certainly helpful, bringing it here.

audio and the operations matter, right? prep, the scheduling, the editing, you know, the social cut downs, it's a real engine behind each episode that you need to manage and plan for. And then I think lastly, you need to have fun, right? It's extra, it's something extra in your life. So if you don't find it fun, if you don't see it as some type of outlet or creative expression,

if you're doing it with someone else, you certainly need to have a partner that you truly enjoy and believe complements what you bring to the podcast, right? You don't want a duplicate and clone of yourself, you really, think bringing together that dynamic and that energy is what really creates the magic, especially for Jackie and I.

Jess Gaedeke (22:12)
Yeah, definitely. Well, your chemistry is very clear. partnership. Okay, we're going to move to the final dig. This is all about you as an individual. So feel free to take off the professional hat and just be your almost consumer side of your world here. What's the last product or service you bought on impulse? And you can't the foundation It has to be something else.

Cristina Marinucci (22:32)
again, I buy on social media a lot, so it's definitely there. just bought something, it was like a, a gem, kind of a bedazzler, if you will, for your hair, and I bought it for my girls, and literally it just like punches into your hair, all these little gems, it's so cute and so fast. saw it, again, social media scrolling, and it looks like a great little gift for them.

Jess Gaedeke (22:55)
That's awesome. Oh, that's very cool. What's a product or a category or brand that you could justify any price point for? You just have to have it in your life.

Cristina Marinucci (23:03)
think it's more experiences like those travel experiences other type of we go to. I can talk myself into almost any price point on that if it means time away together, fewer distractions, new place to explore, memories to be made. I my spot.

Jess Gaedeke (23:23)
Yeah, it makes sense. Do you have a trip coming up that you're planning?

Cristina Marinucci (23:26)
I do, we're going away on a cruise after Christmas over the New Year's Caribbean, Mexico and Honduras actually.

Jess Gaedeke (23:35)
something to look forward to. That's awesome. we all know brands have distinct personalities. What's a brand that you would date and a brand that you would marry and it's up to you. They can be different brands.

Cristina Marinucci (23:36)
Yeah.

a good question. I'm like, do I ask this to the younger Christina or the older one? I'm just kidding. I'd probably date early days Apple. Like Apple was, I think back in the day more rebellious, right? Think different version that was breaking the rules and didn't care who it made uncomfortable. a younger me, but today I'd marry

Jess Gaedeke (23:48)
Now, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Cristina Marinucci (24:07)
apple of today. I think it's still very like design obsessed, innovative, incredibly consistent, integrated into your daily life, committed to the long game, right? So I think it's that younger kind of boldness rebellious has now and become ⁓

much more future oriented, dependable, and really build a whole ecosystem around it, which would be something attractive and good in a partner for the long term.

Jess Gaedeke (24:37)
So interesting to think about a brand as it was, say 20 years ago, and that you would be interested in dating it and then marrying it today. That actually is like the definition of the best partner. That's like really interesting. Very an industry leader that you think we should bring on the podcast?

Cristina Marinucci (24:44)
Thank

Yeah, you got it.

love to hear from like Indra Nui and perspective on the kind of the long-term strategy performance with purpose and leading through massive changes like we are now in global CPG. definitely want to hear more of the unfiltered version now that she's not at the helm of the business anymore. Like what would she do differently if she were starting out in today's like

more data-driven, complex digital world. certainly with AI changing the game as we speak, I think that'd be really cool to hear from her.

Jess Gaedeke (25:31)
man. That's crazy to think if I could ever actually interview her, I would be so nervous. Yeah, but it'd be worth it. So finally, what keeps you inspired in your work and your day to day?

Cristina Marinucci (25:36)
Same. ⁓

at work it certainly make like that impact, right? And, you the idea that, better insight or, can literally change how.

of people experience a brand and their lives. So I don't think for me that gets old. It's, you know, uncovering that insight, but really seeing it play out and the actionable like impact that has on people's lives. I think in both professional and personal, it's also about the people, people I'm building with and for my team.

my peers and obviously my daughters and I care a lot about the human side and kind of the how of leadership and the culture and the opportunities that I'm and hopefully that I'd be proud for them to step into one day as well. I think just that we're connecting to real people and real progress is when it does that it's easy to stay inspired.

Jess Gaedeke (26:41)
Yeah, said. And this has been such an inspiring conversation. So Christina, thank you for joining on the podcast and putting another plug in for the She Commerce podcast that Christina It's really worth a listen. thank you for bringing that thought leadership to the industry. So well done.

Cristina Marinucci (26:51)
you

Thank you for having me. I appreciate

it. Thank you for the support.