Last updated on September 12th, 2021 at 04:05 pm
Providence, Rhode Island-based United Natural Foods Inc. has promoted Steve Dietz to the newly created role of chief customer officer, effective Oct. 1. Dietz will be responsible for overseeing UNFI’s sales efforts throughout the United States and Canada.
Dietz currently serves as UNFI’s president of the Pacific Region, a position he’s held since 2018. As CCO, Dietz will support the region teams, driving business growth and helping ensure UNFI delivers on its long-term vision to transform the future of food. 
The sales regions include UNFI’s National, Atlantic, South, Central, Pacific and Canadian divisions. Working with the region presidents, Dietz will help implement a local go-to market strategy while leveraging data, learnings and outcomes to drive best practices and programs that can benefit all UNFI customers.
“Steve is a terrific selection for this role, and I’m confident his leadership will help us further unlock the customer experience, delivering greater value and innovation to grocery retailers of all sizes and formats,” said UNFI President Chris Testa. “We have a tremendous responsibility to our customers and communities, and Steve’s experience, sales acumen and strong understanding of the ever-changing grocery landscape will help us continue to deliver on our customer promise.”
Dietz joined UNFI in 2014 through the acquisition of Tony’s Fine Foods, where he had previously spent 15 years in leadership roles overseeing sales, customer service, procurement, marketing and pricing. He has served in his current leadership role since the completion of the Supervalu acquisition, helping bring together multiple sales teams under one cohesive Pacific Region organization.
Dietz holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of California-Davis and an MBA from the University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School. In addition to his work at UNFI, Dietz also currently serves as a member of the executive board for the California Grocers Association.
A new Pacific Region president will be named later this fall.
UNFI is a food wholesaler delivering the widest variety of products to customer locations throughout North America, including natural product superstores, independent retailers, conventional supermarket chains, e-commerce retailers and food service customers. UNFI is the largest publicly traded grocery distributor in the United States.
