PepsiCo public affairs and communications department in DACH repositions itself

Since the beginning of 2021, Sascha Urlau has strengthened the team of PepsiCo's "Public Affairs & Communications" department. The 34-year-old - who started his career at PepsiCo and has worked as Event Project Manager and Senior Event Coordinator for the last five and a half years - is now expanding his area of responsibility and will be responsible for Corporate Events & Partnerships. "As a global player, we also want to become more visible on a national level," explains Sascha Urlau with regard to the DACH region. "In my new role, I will be first point of contact and driver of sponsorships and engagements on behalf of PepsiCo. A key focus of my role will also be organizing political events and pushing and intensifying into strategic partnerships."

Within the Public Affairs & Communications department, Adriana Cerami (30) will take on the position of Head of Corporate Communications for PepsiCo D/A/CH. Cerami, who has been with PepsiCo for a year and a half and previously worked as a product communications specialist at Hyundai Motor Deutschland GmbH and as a consultant at Fischer Appelt, among others, will act in her role at PepsiCo in particular as the main contact for media. "In the past, we have addressed many relevant issues on a global and national level and initiated trend-setting measures, but without talking about them publicly and taking a stand," Cerami says. Just recently, for example, PepsiCo tightened its global climate targets and transformed its production so that by the end of 2021 it will be the first beverage company in Germany to use only 100% recycled plastic (rPET) in all beverage bottles of its carbonated soft drinks and iced teas. Cerami adds, "Our sustainability agenda is certainly the most concrete and largest set of topics that I would like to emphasize more strongly in terms of communication in the future. In general, however, my aim is to close our communication gap with the outside world and to become a reliable and trustworthy contact for the media."

The head of the three-man team is Kai Klicker-Brunner (36), who joined PepsiCo four months ago as Head of Public Policy, Governmental Affairs & Communications D/A/CH and member of the Executive Board. Klicker-Brunner, who previously worked for around eight years at Philip Morris International (most recently as Manager Global Government Affairs), heads the department and assumes responsibility for Public Affairs. Accordingly, from now on he will focus on the dialogue with stakeholders and decision-makers from politics, business and society. "In the past, PepsiCo has not been particularly present in the public debate on the relevant issues of our time and has also not been open enough to outside conversations and impulses," says Klicker-Brunner. "In the future, I would like to give the ambitious agenda of the world's second-largest food company a face to stakeholders and decision-makers in this country as well, and promote exchange and cooperation."