Unilever Europe President awards internship to ECR Europe Student Award winner

Kees van der Graaf, President Europe Unilever, today awarded an internship to the winner of this year’s ECR Student Award, Aristeidis Theotokis, a student at the Athens University of Economics and Business. “I am delighted to offer you a unique experience in bringing together a business agenda with a social agenda by inviting you for a three-month internship with the United Nations World Food Programme,” said Mr. van der Graaf. The internship was awarded as part of Unilever’s ‘Together for Child Vitality’ partnership with WFP.

In announcing the winners of the 2007 8th ECR Europe Student Awards, Robert Wilkinson, Co-chairman of the International Commerce Institute, said "Unilever has sponsored the Gold Award for the first time this year and the award of an internship in this connection underlines Unilever’s commitment to these awards."

Gold Award to Greek student

The 2007 Gold Award was won by Aristeidis Theotokis for an outstanding combination of creativity, good research design and great managerial value. Congratulating the winner, Mr. van der Graaf said, “the winning paper by Mr. Theotokis offers extremely useful insights on how to promote and evaluate innovation in retailing. This fits perfectly with the ECR approach and the theme of the 2007 Milan Forum & Marketplace Passion for Growth - Serving the Shopper through Innovation.

Silver Award to Dutch student

The Silver Award went to Alex van den Heijkant of the Technical University in Eindhoven for his paper on Selecting the logic logistic structure for superstores. “This paper contributes to the understanding of the drivers of efficiency in retail logistics, since the logistics structure of a retail company has a tremendous impact on its efficiency,” said Professor Pellegrini, Director for the awards and a Professor at Italy's IULM.

Bronze Award to Finnish student

The Bronze Award went to Ville Pätynen of the Helsinki University of Technology for a paper on Applying automated store ordering to improve store replenishment in speciality retail, which proposes to extend the ECR approach in this area beyond the FMCG industry. The ECR Academic Advisory Panel commended this paper for being “perfectly in line with what ECR has been doing in researching and promoting new and more efficient store ordering for many years.”

About the ECR Europe Student Awards:

Each year Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards are made for a constructive, provocative or instructive contribution to the objectives of ECR. The awards are presented at the annual ECR Europe Forum & Marketplace, which this year is being held in Milan from May 8-10. The entries for the award are judged by an ECR Europe Academic Advisory Panel for their creativity and originality of thought, structured, professional presentation and practical implications. This year’s Gold Award winner receives a prize of €1,000 and a 3 month internship; the Silver Award carries a prize of €750; the Bronze Award carries a prize of €500.

About ECR Europe

The ECR ("Efficient Consumer Response") movement effectively began more than a decade ago when new principles of collaborative management along the supply chain were emerging from the understanding that companies can serve consumers better, faster and at less cost by working together with trading partners.

Dramatic advances in information technology, growing competition, pressure on margins, global business structures and consumer demand focused on better choice, service, convenience, quality, freshness and safety and the increasing movement of goods across international borders aided by the European single market were changing the paradigm.

This new reality required a fundamental re-think of operational practices and of the conventional separation of the roles of manufacturers and retailers. To better serve the consumer, ECR has inverted the traditional model and breaks down non-productive barriers. The impacts were extensive and continue to resonate across industry.

About the International Commerce Institute:

The mission of the International Commerce Institute is to bring about a behavioural change in relationships among thousands of Consumer Goods practitioners by promoting joint value creation through shared learning and the implementation of ECR best practice. The Institute's activities include:

• accreditation and industry qualification programmes to ensure consistency and a high-level of quality across national boundaries;
• executive and vocational education programmes to foster broad-scale change in the way business is conducted within and between retailer and manufacturer companies;
• partnerships with academia to ensure that ECR knowledge is developed, shared and disseminated both in academic curricula and within retailer and manufacturer companies throughout the world;
• publications to disseminate ECR knowledge.

About the Unilever/UN Partnership:

Unilever is one of the world’s largest consumer goods companies, with a turnover of €40 billion in 2006. Its mission is to add Vitality to Life and its portfolio consists of well known food, home care and personal care brands such as Axe, Becel, Flora, Knorr, Hellmann’s, Magnum, Ben and Jerry’s, Dove, Omo, Lipton, Lux, Sunsilk, Surf and Rexona.

Last year Unilever signed a 3-year partnership with the United Nations World Food Programme to combat child hunger. The objective of this partnership, called Together for Child Vitality’, is to improve the nutrition and health of school-aged children.

The World Food Programme’s school feeding programme links food and education by offering free meals in school to the world’s most vulnerable children. It costs about €0.15 to provide a meal to a hungry child.

Blue Band/Rama margarine will be the first Unilever brand to raise awareness of child hunger and funds for school meals through its marketing activities. The internship will focus on how to market Rama/Blue Band’s support for school feeding with specific customers and add the same time assist in child development.