Diamond Foods promotes marketing, general counsel executives

SAN FRANCISCO Diamond Foods announced the promotion of two of its top executives.

Andrew Burke has been promoted to chief marketing officer and EVP, while Stephen Kim has been appointed SVP general counsel and human resources. Both executives will have expanded responsibilities with these promotions.

Burke has led Diamond's marketing group since joining as a VP in June 2006. He will continue to oversee all marketing activities for the company and will take on the leadership of Diamond Foods' pricing committee, which is a highly collaborative group comprised of marketing, sales and finance team members.

"Andrew has excelled and grown tremendously in his role in leading Diamond's marketing efforts," said Diamond Foods president and CEO Michael J. Mendes. "He has always worked effectively with sales, operations and finance, which will be critical in his new strategic pricing role. We will look for Andrew to continue to enable the development and execution of a tightly integrated, consumer facing marketing strategy that is evidenced by every element of the consumer and trade interface, something that has become a trademark of our brand strategy over the years."

Kim has been Diamond's general counsel VP since May 2005. His role broadened to include leadership of human resources in January 2008. He will continue to lead all aspects of Diamond's legal and HR efforts, but will increase his focus on strategic HR management.

"While Steve has been a strong asset for Diamond in managing our legal affairs, he has truly distinguished himself in his ability to source and develop outstanding management talent," said Mendes. "Given the dynamic growth of our organization, Steve will dedicate more time to strengthening our management team to better enable us to deliver on our strategic objectives."