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Gonzalo Checa is no stranger to navigating challenging situations as the vice president of procurement and category management for hospitality company Delaware North—but that aptitude runs deep. Growing up, his home country Peru faced hyperinflation and terrorism. Checa beat the odds by earning a scholarship to a prestigious bilingual school in Lima, Peru, that paved the way for him to attend Universidad del Pacífico, where he graduated summa cum laude with a degree in business administration.
There, he fell in love with not only education but also the woman who became his wife. She supported him along the way, both in his personal and professional journey. He recalls being fresh out of college in the mid-1990s when he had to launch the Pringles brand in Peru for manufacturing company Procter & Gamble. He made a splash in his native country by using multiple media outlets to advertise the brand.
The couple, unlike the rest of their family members, decided to leave Peru because Checa was accepted to Harvard Business School. There, he learned how to think more broadly, act decisively, and inspire others to achieve their full potential from real-life business leadership challenges.
Then, he found his first job in the US working for manufacturing company Kimberly-Clark. The couple’s school-age children were soon teaching them about the Pledge of Allegiance and what it means to be an American. The Checas became US citizens in 2012, and the anticipated short stint in the US turned permanent.
“I know I’ve been very fortunate in my own life, and it gives me immense joy to support others.”
Gonzalo Checa
Checa and his wife, who have been married for more than twenty-five years, currently reside in Charlotte, North Carolina. Their oldest son moved to Boston to work for Deloitte after graduating from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, and the youngest is currently a junior at Cornell University.
Checa has always been interested in consumer products and the many factors that make guests and customers purchase items or choose one service over another. He combined that interest with a knack for building high-performing teams and solving complex problems as he worked his way up the corporate America ladder.
He has worked for several organizations during his career, both at global Fortune 500 companies and at small, family-owned businesses. Some have been his home for many years, while others were shorter stops on the way to something else.
After eight years with Kimberly-Clark, Checa found himself working as the president of a food safety division within a privately owned company. He grew the company’s portfolio and closed large deals with Target and Chick-fil-A during a crushing recession. After a couple of years, a new opportunity came, and Checa pivoted into hospitality and procurement by joining Foodbuy at Compass Group USA. Over five years, he managed supplier relationships in food, beverages, supplies, equipment, and services—and helped reverse the declining trend of the nonalcoholic beverage category, seeing it grow by between 3 percent and 7 percent annually.
He then pivoted to consulting franchises to help them develop new capabilities and scale for growth. This opportunity allowed him to work with franchises all over the world.
But a desire to return to the hospitality industry led Checa to apply with Delaware North, which serves a half-billion guests across three continents. Checa got the job in early March 2020, just as the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic. Weeks after starting his new job, Checa and a majority of his colleagues were furloughed.
The unexpected time off gave him plenty of time to assess his situation and reflect on where he had been and all that he has experienced. Although he had long served on volunteer boards and nonprofit organizations, he decided to increase his involvement by joining the board of directors—both with Easterseals UCP of North Carolina & Virginia and Charlotte Bilingual Preschool, which provides bilingual education to Hispanic children while supporting Hispanic immigrants. “I know I’ve been very fortunate in my own life, and it gives me immense joy to support others,” Checa says.
“Take the initiative to offer your expertise to create value, even if it goes beyond your narrow job description, and value the diversity of thought.”
Gonzalo Checa
By mid-2020, the furloughed period was over and Checa rejoined Delaware North with an enhanced role. Instead of his original responsibilities with direct procurement, he would oversee all procurement and would need to rebuild his team while navigating the tumultuous post-COVID times. His job as vice president of procurement and category management is to partner with suppliers and internal stakeholders to add value at every step of the supply chain life cycle.
Nearly four years later, Checa has elevated his department by transforming it from a tactical to strategic approach. “We go beyond placing purchase orders and RFPs [request for proposals] or getting the lowest cost for products and services,” he says. “We’re really creating value with our suppliers by ensuring high quality, reliability, and continuity of supplies so we can delight our guests and provide them with memorable experiences.”
Accomplishing these results in the middle of a pandemic wasn’t easy as guests and fans stopped visiting the arenas, stadiums, parks, restaurants, resorts, hotels, and casinos that Delaware North serves.
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So, how did Checa do it? Partnerships.
Delaware North partners with providers that best resonate with guest needs and align with the company’s mission, vision, and values. He immediately restructured roles and responsibilities on his team, worked to increase effectiveness, and improved supplier relationships to unleash maximum value. “There are a lot of things we can do better together, such as understanding consumer insights on trends, working on joint marketing initiatives, and improving sustainability and DEI [diversity, equity, and inclusion],” he explains.
“Since 2009, we have been honored to serve as a trusted partner of Delaware North. Gonzalo’s thoughtful leadership, collaborative approach, and extensive expertise consistently yield positive outcomes for our partnership,” says Matt Johnson, senior director of foodservice at PepsiCo. “On a personal level, I have enjoyed working with Gonzalo and, over the years, I have developed a high level of trust and admiration for the work he does. I look forward to our ongoing collaboration and to delivering high-quality food and beverage products to patrons across Delaware North’s operations.”
Over his tenure at Delaware North, Checa has exceeded aggressive targets for cost savings and other metrics every year. He’s accomplished this by renegotiating contracts and taking other measures to drive compliance. In 2023, his team exceeded its targets for cost savings and avoidance. Checa also built an annual partner summit and joined Delaware North’s DEI advisory council and corporate social responsibility advisory council.
Previous stops on Checa’s professional journey prepared him well to make an impact at Delaware North. No matter how short or lengthy an employee’s tenure may be, they can make a big impact at each company they are a part of. “Anyone who is curious and open to learning will make a mark,” he says. “Take the initiative to offer your expertise to create value, even if it goes beyond your narrow job description, and value the diversity of thought.”
That’s the playbook Checa developed and followed throughout his own career.
Often, Checa says, smart, dedicated, and passionate employees will find a new way to incorporate past experience into current roles. Now, he has recently updated Delaware North’s nonalcoholic cold beverage portfolio—just like he did at Compass Group USA. Under Checa’s leadership, Delaware North is keeping its strong relationship with Pepsi and also signed a company-wide agreement to add key Coca-Cola and Keurig Dr Pepper products in all locations. The move brings both a better product assortment that will drive revenue and margin growth while delivering substantial net-savings over the five-year agreement.
It will be a busy 2024 for Checa and Delaware North alike. The company recently surpassed $4 billion in revenue, and Checa is busy rolling out a new strategic supplier partner framework, kicking off the evaluation of alcohol supplier partners for a new and improved program that will start in 2025, renegotiating contracts in various categories, and enhancing his team’s capabilities and resources.
He’s also found one other important way to make an impact: starting a Hispanic employee resource group—the very first of its kind in Delaware North’s 110-year history.
PepsiCo products are enjoyed by consumers more than one billion times a day in more than two hundred countries and territories around the world. PepsiCo’s beverage and convenient foods portfolio includes Lay’s, Doritos, Cheetos, Gatorade, Pepsi-Cola, Mountain Dew, Quaker and SodaStream. PepsiCo’s product portfolio includes a wide range of enjoyable foods and beverages, including many iconic brands that generate more than $1 billion each in estimated annual retail sales.
PepsiCo has worked closely with Delaware North since 2009, when the hospitality company named PepsiCo as a preferred partner of fountain drinks and packaged food and beverage products for its US operations. Delaware North serves PepsiCo products at most of its nearly two hundred operating locations, including sports venues, airports, national and state parks, restaurants, resorts, hotels, and casinos.
The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE: KO) is a total beverage company with products sold in more than two hundred countries and territories. Our company’s purpose is to refresh the world and make a difference. We sell multiple billion-dollar brands across several beverage categories worldwide. We seek to positively impact people’s lives, communities and the planet through water replenishment, packaging recycling, sustainable sourcing practices and carbon emissions reductions across our value chain. Learn more at coca-colacompany.com.
