Mark is the R&D Director for Barry Callebaut Americas. Since October 2008 his key responsibilities include managing the R&D personnel and R&D projects for all of the Americas, including R&D labs in St. Hyacinthe, Pennsauken, Brazil, and Monterrey. He also manages Technical Advisor NA and acts as a liaison to customers, sales, and R&D.  He establishes R&D departments for any new facilities in the Americas, directs new product development projects and items in the R&D laboratories following requests by external and internal customers and assures development of internal and external clients’ relations to maintain communication and provide technical support. Previous to this he was the R&D/QA Director Europe for Godiva Chocolatier in Brussels, Belgium where he managed the development and launch of over 60 products and implemented new product development processes. Before this he held many different titles at Barry Callebaut and held positions of ever-increasing responsibility. He started as a Management Trainee in the Quality Department where he was responsible for preparing and leading ISO-9001 recertification audit then he was moved to lead the Transport Department in Belgium where he led the department and 30 drivers. From there he became the R&D Manager for Southern Europe and Overseas Countries where he helped to increase sales in Italy and Southern Europe by finding customers focused on new products and solutions.  And finally, he became a QA Manager for Barry Callebaut Belgium, where he was responsible for the department and a facility including an analytical laboratory, microbiological laboratory and a sensory laboratory. Here he played a leading role during two ISO-9001 recertification audits and was the external lead auditor of Quality Systems. Mark’s career started as a Junior Sales Manager at YSCO in Langemark, Belgium after graduating from Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium in 1994. He furthered his schooling by graduating from the University of Leige also in Belgium in 1995 and finally in 2001 became a graduate of Vlerick Management School in Ghent, Belgium with a Technical M.B.A. He currently resides in Cherry Hill, New Jersey with his wife and two children.

Alison Reich Bodor

National Confectioners Association

Alison Bodor joined the National Confectioners Association in 2000. As Vice President of Regulatory and Scientific Affairs, Ms. Bodor manages food policy, research and regulatory issues including food safety and quality, labeling and compliance, health and nutrition, and international trade as they relate to confections.

Peter Braun

Bühler AG, Switzerland

Mr. Peter Braun has been the Head of  R&D, Technology and Marketing, Business unit cocoa and chocolate at Bühler AG, Switzerland since 2006 after working as Head of Processing and Technology, Business unit cocoa and chocolate, Bühler AG, Switzerland for five years. Prior to this he was a Process Engineer, Kraft Foods Germany, Operations and R&D for Cocoa and Chocolate and Team Leader Process development for Chocolate, R&D, Kraft Foods. Parallel to his work at Kraft he worked on and completed his Doctoral Thesis at the Swiss Federal Inst. of Technology (ETH) Zurich, Switzerland under Prof. Dr. Erich J.  Windhab. His thesis topic was “About Physical- Chemical Factors and their influence on Rheology and Structure of Chocolate like Model Systems”. He studied Chemical Process Engineering at the Technical University Karlsruhe in Germany.

Shelley Carr is a graduate of Michigan State University with a Bachelors Degree in Food Science. She has been employed in the Dairy Industry for twenty five years in various positions including Quality, Food Safety, R&D and Technical Services. Shelley has been working at the Warrell Corporation since 2001 as the Quality Manager.

John Cooke

John is a 25 year veteran of the Confectionery industry.  During his career he has held several positions including Production Supervisor, Shift Manager, Director of Quality Assurance, Plant Manager, Director of Manufacturing, Vice President of Manufacturing, Executive Vice President, and Managing Partner.

John has also served on the PMCA Program Committee, the NCA Technical Committee and as an AACT Counselor. He has presented several times at the PMCA, AACT and NCA conferences. As a consultant to the confectionery industry, John has worked on product development, production line design and installation as well as production efficiency. He is currently CFO for the Tennessee Valley Public Power Association, Secretary-Treasurer for Distributors Insurance Company, and  Secretary-Treasurer for Seven States Power Corporation, a Generation and Transmission Cooperative with $500M in generating assets. John is a graduate of the University of Tennessee and currently resides with his wife, Gail in Chattanooga.

Lisa Hammond

Kellogg Company

Lisa is a Michigan native, born and raised in the Metro Detroit suburbs. She went to school at Wayne State University in Detroit Michigan, where she earned her Bachelor of Science in Nutrition and Food Science in 2001. Lisa started her professional career in a laboratory setting at the Michigan Department of Community Health. Within a year, she began a career in the food industry working as a quality and bake lab technologist at a small baking mix company in Michigan. In 2006 she joined the Kellogg Company. Lisa began her role there as a Quality Ingredient Manager, and still holds that role and enjoys it very much. In August of 2009, she completed her Masters of Science in Food Safety at Michigan State University.

Lisa has a passion for the quality and safety of food ingredients, and works daily with internal and external peers to ensure the ingredients she oversees are of the utmost quality possible.

In her spare time, Lisa enjoys training her German Shepherds, inline skating, and cooking and baking.

Jennifer Hoffmann

FONA

Since she joined FONA in 2000, Jennifer has been an integral part of establishing a comprehensive regulatory system. Under Jennifer’s leadership, the regulatory department processes more than 20,000 documents a year from more than 3,500 customer requests — all while maintaining an industry-leading customer response and accuracy rate. Jennifer has a B.A. from the State University of New York.

Rose Potts

The Blommer Chocolate Company

Rose holds a B.S. degree in Food Science from the Pennsylvania State University and has worked for Blommer Chocolate Company for almost 25 years. Blommer is the largest roaster of cocoa beans in North America selling chocolate for use in candy making as well as various cocoa powders, and chocolate chips.  She has performed various functions including cocoa bean inspector, Sanitation Supervisor, Quality Control Supervisor as well as working as part of the Research and Development team with the emphasis on Sensory Evaluation. Her work with the Research and Development team has provided the opportunity to taste with most of the development teams representing the major brands that you know to some of the more specialized chocolatiers.  In so doing, she has conducted chocolate training and taste seminars within Blommer chocolate company as well for candy manufacturers and their conventions.  Such papers included “Sensory Evaluation of  Chocolate…Speak the language of the food of the gods” presented at the National American Association of Candy Technologist’s convention as well as various  seminars on chocolate tasting, chocolate and wine tasting , sugarfree products and chocolate  trends at the Philadelphia National Gift and Gourmet Show, Retail Confectioners International Convention, Chocolate Manufacturer’s Association and the  Pennsylvania Manufacturing Confectioner’s Association.  Most recently she has been promoted to Corporate Manager of Sensory and Product Guidance for Blommer Chocolate.