Mercato Makes Executive Moves
Mercato, the online grocery e-commerce platform for independent food retailers, has hired three executives. Jeffrey Bishop-Hill is now VP of operations, Mike Durand is now VP of sales, and Leo Zhu is now VP of product.
“We’re incredibly excited to welcome these talented leaders to the Mercato team,” said Bobby Brannigan, founder and CEO of San Diego-based Mercato. “Each of these individuals has a proven track record in their field and deep, well-honed skill sets that will be a terrific help as we continue on a path of aggressive growth and expansion of our marketplace.”
Bishop-Hill will focus on operations and positively influencing the merchant-customer experience, as well as continue to advance Mercato’s tech infrastructure to streamline costs and facilitate continued growth. He joins the company from Los Angeles-based Soothe, where, as SVP of operations, he helped the wellness marketplace expand its service area from 12 U.S. cities to 73 cities in six countries. Before Soothe, Bishop-Hill held operations, marketing and customer experience roles at a number of early-stage companies.
Durand will head several established teams within Mercato that are focused on mid-market sales, customer success and account management. Before Mercato, he was regional VP of sales at Boston-based Toast Inc., a computer software company servicing the restaurant industry. Durand also spent more than eight years at Chicago-based Groupon, where he held various sales leadership roles.
Zhu will manage the overall product strategy, roadmap, and execution at Mercato. He joins company from Walmart.com where he was director of product. Zhu was also director of product at Jet.com, which was acquired by Bentonville, Arkansas-based Walmart for $3.3 billion with much fanfare and quietly discontinued four years later. An early Jet.com employee, he helped scale the e-commerce startup from pre-launch to post-acquisition. Most recently, Zhu founded and built Lewis, an online travel-planning service.
Bishop-Hill lives in San Diego; Durand resides in Omaha, Nebraska; and Zhu is based in Los Angeles.
Operating in 45 states, Mercato connects consumers to more than 1,000 independently owned grocery stores and specialty markets.
Bentonville, Arkansas-based Walmart operates more than 11,300 stores under 58 banners in 27 countries, and e-commerce websites, employing 2.2 million-plus associates worldwide. Walmart U.S. is No. 1 on The PG 100, Progressive Grocer's list of the top food and consumables retailers in North America, while Walmart-owned Sam's Club ranks No. 9 on the list.
