Pedro DeJesús serves as Head of International Business& Corporate Secretary for Tampico Beverages, Inc. He is a member of the Company’s Executive Leadership Team and serves on its Board of Directors. Tampico Beverages is one of the world’s leading manufacturers and marketers of high quality and value-added flavored drink concentrates. Selling under the TAMPICO® brand name, it is a category-leading flavored drink brand in the United States and in over 40 countries around the globe. Tampico Beverages is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Houchens Industries, Inc., a diversified conglomerate that employs over 16,000 employee owners in a wide variety of businesses such as retail grocery and convenience stores, quick-to- service restaurants, insurance, manufacturing, software, recycling, tanning supply distribution, franchising of optical stores, financial services, and property management. Houchens Industries is the largest 100% employee-owned company in America.
Mr. DeJesús directs and manages a range of strategic and business initiatives for Tampico Beverages. His principal areas of focus include overall executive leadership and management of the Company’s global operations and providing business and strategic advice to the management team and the Board of Directors. He plans, develops and leads comprehensive strategies for the Company’s International Business Division and manages a team of 20+ sales and marketing professionals with a focus on accelerating volume growth and integrating the Company into core markets through relationship management of customers in over 40 countries. He has substantial experience managing culturally diverse teams in the United States, Africa, Brazil, Spain, Asia and throughout Central and Latin America. He also oversees and directly manages all domestic and international commercial negotiations and global legal affairs, including intellectual property rights management, M&A, corporate governance, risk management, corporate facilities management, domestic and international litigation and arbitration, global outside counsel management, and internal legal compliance education and strategies.
Mr. DeJesús serves as an Independent Non-Executive Director of Lake Forest Bank & Trust Company, N.A., the flagship bank of Wintrust Financial Corporation (NASDAQ: WTFC) and is Chair of the Audit Committee. He is a member of the Economic Club of Chicago and serves on the Board of Trustees of the Museum of Science and Industry (Member, Building & Grounds Committee) and on the Boards of Directors of the Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago (Compliance Committee Vice Chair and member of the Audit Committee), the City Colleges of Chicago Foundation, the NEA Foundation (Co-chair, Succession Planning Task Force and member of the Audit Committee) and the Latino Corporate Directors Education Foundation (Member, Finance Committee). In addition, from 2011 to 2018 Mr. DeJesús also served, through a joint appointment by the then-Secretary of Commerce and then-United States Trade Representative, on the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Industry Trade Advisory Committee on Consumer Goods (ITAC-4). ITAC is a public-private partnership that engages business leaders in formulating U.S. trade policy.
Mr. DeJesús received Chicago United’s Business Leaders of Color Award and Diversity MBA Magazine selected Mr. DeJesús as one of the Top 100 Under 50 Diverse Executive Leaders in the United States. Mr. DeJesús was featured as one of Chicago’s Very Own by Chicago’s WGN Television and the American Diabetes Associations honored him as Father of the Year. Mr. DeJesús received the Individual Corporate Excellence award by Negocios Now publication, who also recognized him as one of the 50 Most Influential Latinos in the Chicago Area.
Mr. DeJesús holds a B.A. from Roosevelt University and a J.D. from Northwestern University School.
