NEW CHIEFS ARE APPOINTED AT BEARS AND WASPS
NEW CHIEF EXECUTIVE MAKES VOW
WARWICKSHIRE have announced Stuart Cain will replace Neil Snowball as the club’s chief executive.
Cain is a well-known figure in the West Midlands’ business community and the broader sports and entertainment sector, in which he has amassed more than 20 years’ experience.
He joins the Bears after three years at Wasps Holdings Limited where he held a number of positions, most recently CEO, and helped establish Wasps’ rugby and netball teams at the Ricoh Arena after the move from London.
In that time, he has also developed the Ricoh’s conference, exhibition and concert business, as well as their wider estate masterplan, including the development of additional hotel, retail and leisure space.
He is replaced at Wasps by Stephen Vaughan who joined the company last year with responsibility for all of its sporting operations and has implemented several major changes, including the appointment of a new rugby management team.
Vaughan will now have responsibility for the combined group activities including conferences, exhibitions, concerts and all sponsorship and commercial activities.
Prior to joining Wasps, Cain spent more than seven years with the NEC Group as managing director of commercial marketing.
His career has also included commercial and marketing leadership roles in football with Wolves and Rangers, as well as leading the sports practice of global media agency WPP, which involved working with FIFA on the World Cup in South Africa and initiatives in Asia and the USA. Before working in sport he was marketing services director at Molson Coors in Burton-on-trent, masterminding Carling’s sponsorship of the Premier League. Cain is expected to join Warwickshire in August following the departure of Snowball, who will leave Edgbaston after four-and-a-half years to take up a position as managing director of county cricket with the England & Wales Cricket Board.
“I’m very excited at the prospect of working with the management team and board to deliver a new era of sporting success on the field, while working with the wider team to build new levels of community involvement
Stephen Vaughan is Wasps’ new Group Chief Executive and deliver the next phase of Edgbaston’s development,” said Cain. “Neil has really moved Warwickshire forward and I’m relishing the opportunity to build on his legacy.
“I’ve been a regular visitor to Edgbaston over the years and witnessed some great games. By a quirk of fate, I have also played cricket at the Edgbaston Community Sports Ground, when I worked in the beer trade, so I’m looking forward to going back again. The club has very proud traditions and its men’s and women’s teams have achieved great success across all formats of the game. We need to continue this into the future.
“In Edgbaston, we have one of the world’s great sporting venues, which consistently stages the biggest fixtures in the game and offers outstanding facilities that can be utilised all year round. Part of my role will be to develop this multi-use philosophy further.
“With the second phase of the masterplan due to get under way soon and a third phase due to be launched in the near future, I’m looking forward to working with the team at Edgbaston and with our major local and national stakeholders to support the development of cricket in Birmingham, Warwickshire and the wider West Midlands.
“Fate is a wonderful thing; little did I know when organising the Neal Abberley Memorial Trophy between Wasps and the Bears at Knowle & Dorridge CC in 2018 that I would end up swapping sides and working for Warwickshire CCC. I can’t wait.”
Vaughan, who has a degree in Business Management from Loughborough University, said: “Wasps Group is a very dynamic business with exciting potential in all its areas of activity.
“I have really enjoyed my role on the sporting side of the group and believe we now have that in very good shape. I am really motivated in helping to drive forward the overall business and helping to realise the exciting plans we have been putting in place in recent months.
“Clearly this is a very difficult time for the country on every level, but we have been working hard to ensure we have a robust business which will emerge from the current crisis in good shape and ready to really drive forward.”
Wasps Group is a very dynamic business with exciting potential in all its areas of activity. Stuart Cain