Keith Brunell

Nordstrom

Keith Brunell was named corporate chef in 2015. In his role, Keith leads the food and product innovation across the eleven different restaurant concepts and five specialty coffee concepts Nordstrom offers. He works to establish systems and processes for reinvigorating older concepts and creating new concepts that are scalable. He also supports the regional chef team to help drive culinary innovation, operations and purchasing. Keith’s overall focus is creating and executing a menu and operational strategy for each distinctive concept from supporting the kitchen design to the customer experience.

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Peter Vasil

Sysco Canada

Sysco is the global leader in selling, marketing and distributing food products to restaurants, healthcare and education facilities, and lodging establishments, with a presence in 90 countries around the world. Sysco operates 198 distribution facilities serving approximately 425,000 customers with sales of over $50 Billion annually. In 2015 the company completed the acquisition of the Brakes Group, a leading European foodservice distributor with operations in the UK, Ireland, France, Sweden, Spain, Belgium and Luxembourg. Sysco also operates in Canada, Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, Bahamas and Hong Kong.

Guy Pizzuti

Publix

Guy Pizzuti is the Seafood Category Manager at Publix Super Markets Inc. A West Virginia native and graduate from the University of North Carolina-Wilmington with a degree in Marine Biology, he has been responsible for seafood operations at Publix for the past 20 years. Prior to starting his career with Publix, he was a field biologist working out of the National Marine Fisheries Service Southeast Fisheries Science Center in St.

Mike Hacaga

Thrive Market

Mike Hacaga is the Meat and Seafood Product Innovation Lead for Thrive Market. A respected leader in the industry with almost 3 decades of experience, Mike has cultivated strong links directly with farmers and fishermen. Committed to making Thrive Market a truly special program, and putting both your health and the animals welfare first, Mike travels abroad, analyses and interviews many farmers and fishermen directly. This “boots on the ground” process allows a hand picked program which enables Thrive Market to bring the healthiest, highest quality, most humanely treated and environmentally sustainable meat and seafood to your family’s table. Mike is proud to continuously strive to bring the highest rated program to Thrive Market families everyday.

Gregory Jeffers

Director of Purchasing, Gorton’s Inc

Gregory has spent 19 years in the seafood business with Gorton’s Seafood, the leading frozen seafood brand in the United States. He is currently the Director of Purchasing, overseeing procurement activities for all raw material, ingredient and packaging components for Gorton’s seafood items. Greg has held several other positions across a wide breadth of Gorton’s business, beginning there as a Research Food Scientist in 1998. He then spent time in Gorton’s Food Service department, assisting with management of Gorton’s business relationship with McDonald’s. After that role, Greg transitioned to managing key retail and wholesale club accounts in a traditional sales role for several years before moving to his current role in the supply chain area. Greg holds a B.S. and M.S. in Food Science from Cornell University. Greg enjoys spending time outdoors with his wife, Allison, and their two young children.

Chris Follari

Sodexo Foods

Having worked as an Executive Chef in New York and Boston in 2002 and then serving as the NE Director of culinary for corporate services, Chris has earned his new title of Global Director for Sodexo’s Food Platform. In this role, Chris will be focused on continually evolving food standards across the business while actively promoting seasonal and sustainable food offers, motivating the Culinary teams and inspiring them to deliver food to the highest standard with a key focus on quality. He will also lead, design and deployment of global culinary standards and their Love of Food strategy while driving culinary innovation, driving food trends and customer satisfaction. Chris will continue to establish and identify best practice whilst leading the collaboration of regional food leads (culinary directors in country). In his personal time Chris enjoys spending time with his daughter Nigella Sicilia Follari. Chris is a lifelong culinarian, traveler, and cookbook collector.

Jens Peter Klausen

JP Klausen & Co

Jens Peter Klausen started JP Klausen & Co(JPK) while living in New Zealand in the 1980’s. In the mid 1990’s JP Klausen was initiator of getting the New Zealand Hoki fisheries to become the first Groundfish fishery certified as an MSC fishery. From a small start back in Denmark of promoting and distributing New Zealand seafood products, the company has grown into a global player and a part of the Nippon Suisan Group of companies. Jens Peter Klausen is Vice President of the Danish Seafood Association, has served as a advisor on the MSC Advisory Board and today acts as a member of the Nissui International Planning Group.

Dan Aherne

New England Seafood

New England Seafood (NESI) specializes in high quality, premium globally sourced fish and seafood. Dan joined NESI in 2003 after 4 years at Unilever. He was promoted to Managing Director in 2005 and to Group CEO in 2013 after the creation of Joii Sushi Ltd, a specialist business supplying Raw ready to eat fish and seafood products to the Foodservice customer base. He has led the development of the business over 13 years from a £17m to a £160m turnover company combining a well-respected private label supply business in New England Seafood, a progressive Business to Business brand and supply proposition in Joii Sushi, and a growing consumer branded proposition in Leap and Wild Fish Discoveries, which seeks to advance the Group vision of showing people how to enjoy fish every day.

Satoshi Matsumoto

Japanese Consumers Co-Operative

Satoshi Matsumoto has an extensive background in Japanese food business with over 30 years working for the Japanese Consumers’ Co-operative Union (JCCU). During his time at JCCU, Satoshi has worked in logistics management, sales & marketing, product merchandising for CO-OP private brand products, Manager of JCCU’s Joint Development Promotion Department, CO-OP Tohoku region branch manager, General Manager of Marine Products Department & perishable Ingredients, and currently as Merchandising Division Sustainable Procurement.

Gao Linming

Quingdao Yuntai Imports & Exports Co., Ltd.

Qingdao Yutai Imp & Exp Co., Ltd. is a Qingdao, China based merchandiser of value added seafood products to the Chinese domestic market. Yutai, in cooperation with seafood suppliers from around the world, provides sustainable, safe and healthy seafood. Product lines include seafoods from North America, South America, Europe and Asia. Sales companies covers Shanghai, Guangzhou and Qingdao in China and offices in San Francisco in the United States. They created the Chinese brand Mr. Fish and own the brand San Francisco Fishery. Yuntai services both retail and food service channels.