Ahold Delhaize hires Dollar General’s Sanja Krajnovic to head distribution ops

Sanja Krajnovic has joined ADUSA Supply Chain, the distribution and logistics arm of Ahold Delhaize USA, as executive vice president of distribution and transportation.

ADUSA said yesterday that Krajnovic will oversee operations at 19 distribution, transportation and manufacturing centers, which serve more than 2,100 grocery retail locations with over 1.2 billion cases shipped and more than 125 million miles driven annually. In the role, she also joins the supply-chain leadership team amid ADUSA Supply Chain’s ongoing transformation to an integrated, self-managed network, which began almost three years ago.

Based in Scarborough, Maine, the ADUSA Supply Chain family of companies includes ADUSA Supply Chain Services, ADUSA Distribution, ADUSA Transportation and ADUSA Procurement. The network serves the more than 2,000 stores and e-commerce operations of Ahold Delhaize USA’s Stop & Shop, Giant Food, Giant/Martin’s, Food Lion and Hannaford supermarket chains on the East Coast.

“I’m incredibly excited to join the ADUSA Supply Chain team as the network continues its growth and transformation,” Krajnovic (pictured left) said in a statement. “Retail is one of the most exciting industries out there, and the supply chain is the foundation. By continuing to enhance distribution and transportation, the network plays a key role in enabling the brands it supports to be there for their customers when, where and how they want to shop and win in their markets. I look forward to leveraging my prior experience to help advance the network’s ‘Trusted to Always Deliver’ mission and commitment to delivering with excellence every day.”

Related:Ahold Delhaize USA transitions York, Pa., warehouse to self-distribution

Krajnovic comes to ADUSA from deep-discount store giant Dollar General, where she served as senior vice president of store operations, overseeing 9,300 U.S. locations. Before that, she spent 24 years at Target Corp., most recently as group vice president of global supply chain and logistics. In various roles at Target — including group director of global supply chain and logistics, senior site director, regional senior director of food operations and district senior store director — she ran multi-site programs across retail operations, food, global supply chain and logistics, and led numerous strategic initiatives and transformations, ADUSA noted.

“As the brands we support continue to pursue their ambitious omnichannel growth plans and maintain their commitments to meet customer needs every time they shop, it’s critical that we have a laser focus on the operations side of the supply chain,” stated Roger Wheeler, president of ADUSA’s Retail Business Services (RBS) arm and the U.S. leadership team member who oversees the supply chain. “We’re looking forward to leveraging Sanja’s deep retail and supply chain experience as we continue to transform for the future and leverage our network as a competitive edge.”

Related:Ahold Delhaize USA proceeds with shift to self-distribution

Under a three-year supply chain transformation unveiled in December 2019, Zaandam, Netherlands-based parent Ahold Delhaize plans to have more than 85% of its U.S. distribution network — integrating brick-and-mortar and e-commerce — to be self-managed by the end of 2022. The company hit its 2021 transition target last October, with the network reaching self-managed center-store volume of 65%. Most recently, ADUSA integrated an automated distribution center in York, Pa., into its self-managed network, bringing the total number of self-managed facilities to 22.