Gopuff taps Amazon veteran Maria Renz as U.S. head

Instant commerce company Gopuff has hired Maria Renz as senior vice president of North America.

Plans call for Renz, executive vice president of consumer finance and wealth management at SoFi, an online personal finance company, to officially join Gopuff in May. In the newly created leadership role, she will lead Philadelphia-based Gopuff’s strategy and execution in the United States as the fast e-commerce platform expands and deepens its presence across markets. Renz will report directly to Gopuff co-founders and co-CEOs Rafael IIishayev and Yakir Gola.

“I have centered my whole career around the customer, developing new experiences and enhancements that improve their lives. Gopuff is a dynamic company with tremendous opportunity ahead,” Renz (pictured left) said in a statement. “I am excited to help shape this next chapter of growth and further enhance the customer experience as Gopuff continues to define next-gen commerce across North America.”

Gopuff noted that, at San Francisco-based SoFi, Renz led a cross-functional team to grow and develop the company’s money, credit card, and Invest businesses. Her 25-year career includes over 20 years at e-tail giant Amazon, most recently three years as vice president of delivery experience. Prior to that, with her experience investing in autonomy and robotics, she also served as technical adviser to Amazon founder and former CEO Jeff Bezos.

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Also at Amazon, Renz led categories such as health, beauty and grocery and oversaw Amazon subsidiaries including Woot, Abe Books, Endless.com, MyHabit.com and diapers.com. She joined Amazon in 1999 as a product manager in marketing after nearly two years in brand management at Kraft Foods and, before that over a year-and-a-half as a product manager at Hallmark Cards.

“Maria has an incredible track record of successfully leading cross-functional teams, strategically executing on new initiatives and constantly innovating,” Gola stated. “We are excited for Maria to take the reins and help lead our business into its next phase of growth as a truly global leader with a local focus.”

Renz’s appointment comes after Bryan Batista, formerly CEO of booking.com's Rentalcars.com business, joined Gopuff as senior vice president of international in March to lead expansion in markets outside the U.S.

Founded in 2013, Gopuff now delivers in 30 minutes or less in more than 1,200 cities in the U.S., the United Kingdom and France and serves nearly 4 million customers internationally. The company operates out of 600-plus micro-fulfillment and retail sites across the U.S. and Europe, offering consumers an assortment of some 4,000 “instant needs” items such as cleaning and home products, medicine, pet care, office supplies, beauty and wellness items, baby products, food and drinks, and local brands, as well as alcohol and fresh prepared food in some markets. The service is open late in all markets and 24/7 in many areas. Gopuff said it generates an average of over $4 in contribution profit per order and is seeing “continuous category share gains” in key markets such as New York, London and France.

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