‘We like it when investors come in,’ Richard Williams, executive vice president of IR at Unilever, told IR Magazine ahead of the virtual IR Magazine Awards – Europe 2020. ‘We call it touch and feel the business.’
The company takes these events as an opportunity to showcase many levels of management. ‘Usually when we do these things we have the more formal presentations, with the CEO talking about things we’re doing or the head of the supply chain talking about developments there,’ Williams said. ‘But then we try to mix that up with smaller groups where people can go away and meet management and also look at some of the more interesting things we’re doing.’
Sometimes these things are groundbreaking – such as ice-cream delivery drones – sometimes more run of the mill, such as ‘social media listening’. ‘Last year there were also shampoo refilling stations,’ added Williams.
While ice-cream drones certainly help make an event memorable, Williams said the award-winning investor day was also an opportunity to highlight some of the developments the company has in line around sustainability.
At Unilever’s 2019 event, ‘everybody went through a session, in smaller groups, where our head of R&D was talking about what we’re doing on plastic reduction,’ he explained. Doing this at an investor event means people don’t just hear about it – they get to actually see the products, see how they work, how they recycle, how some of them barely use any plastic now. ‘It’s a real touch and feel of the products,’ Williams added.
Watch the video below. You can jump to 6.40 to go straight to Williams talking about Unilever’s 2019 investor day.
Click here to watch all the winners’ videos from the virtual IR Magazine Awards – Europe 2020
