Samantha Greenwood, who spent four years as MPM Products' Global CMO, has been promoted to President of the company's North America business — a signal that the U.K.-based premium cat food group is moving from market entry to deliberate scale in the United States. The appointment, effective July, puts a brand-and-growth executive in the top regional seat at a moment when the U.S. accounts for more than 40.0% of MPM's total revenue.
Why the U.S., Why Now
The timing is deliberate. U.S. pet industry spending hit $158.0 billion in 2025 and is projected to reach $165.0 billion in 2026, according to the American Pet Products Association. Roughly 39.0% of U.S. households own at least one cat, and the post-pandemic adoption wave is now producing a growing cohort of senior cats — a demographic that Greenwood has flagged as a near-term innovation target under the Applaws Healthy Ageing platform. MPM entered the U.S. in earnest in 2021, building retail and e-commerce reach through Chewy, Amazon, and PetSmart. Greenwood's mandate is to push that footprint further, with particular attention to Gen Z pet owners who are disproportionately choosing cats and gravitating toward clean-label, sustainability-credentialed brands.
Before joining MPM in 2022, Greenwood held senior roles at Mondelēz International and Kraft Heinz, working across premium coffee and chocolate categories for eight years from the New Jersey market. That background in high-velocity consumer goods at multinational scale is exactly the kind of commercial infrastructure expertise MPM needs as it moves from challenger positioning to category leadership. CEO Julian Bambridge described her as someone who can "translate insight into commercial success" — language that reads as a brief for accelerating distribution and tightening the brand's retail story rather than simply maintaining momentum.
What This Signals for the Category
For food and beverage operators and brand-launch professionals watching adjacent premium segments, MPM's move is a useful benchmark. The company's three flagship brands — Applaws, Reveal, and Encore — are built on a limited-ingredients, grain-free philosophy with no artificial colors, flavors, or preservatives. That positioning mirrors the clean-label movement that reshaped premium human food over the past decade, and Greenwood's Mondelēz background makes her a credible translator between those two worlds. MPM's B Corporation certification — recertified for five consecutive years, with more than 7.7 million meals donated since 2021 — also gives the brand a sustainability narrative that resonates with the values-driven buyer profiles driving growth in premium specialty retail. Operators and buyers evaluating premium pet food shelf sets or omnichannel assortments should expect MPM to push harder on retailer partnerships, innovation velocity, and brand storytelling under Greenwood's leadership.
For more on how consumer-packaged brands are navigating U.S. retail expansion, see our coverage of brand launch strategy and retail readiness and operator intelligence on premium category trends.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
