IG Design Group plc, the London-listed designer and manufacturer of gift packaging, greeting cards and stationery, has appointed Ari Bensoussan as its Chief Financial Officer. The company announced the appointment on 20 August 2026, with Bensoussan taking up the role and joining the board as an executive director on 1 September 2026.
Bensoussan succeeds Rohan Cummings, who stepped down as Chief Financial Officer and from the board on 31 August 2026 after three years in the role. Cummings will remain with the company until 31 December 2026 to support an orderly handover. The group credited him with contributions during a period of significant change, including the disposal of its DG Americas division and the renegotiation of its banking facilities.
Bensoussan, aged 57, brings nearly 30 years of experience across finance, strategy and mergers and acquisitions in global consumer businesses. He joins from Thai Union Group, the seafood group, where he had served as Chief Financial Officer for Europe since 2021. Before that he spent almost 25 years at Nestle, holding senior roles including Head of Finance and Group Controller at Nestle Waters and Mergers and Acquisitions Director for the wider group.
The appointment comes as IG Design Group positions itself as a more focused business. The company operates across the United Kingdom, Europe and Australia, manages a portfolio of more than 22,000 product lines and supplies retailers in around 70 countries from manufacturing sites in Wales, the Netherlands and Poland. Its heritage brand, Tom Smith, has held a Royal Warrant for Christmas crackers and wrapping paper since 1906.
For a company that has spent recent years simplifying its structure, the finance leadership handover matters as much for continuity as for change. The disposal of DG Americas and the reset of banking arrangements under Cummings left the group with a cleaner balance sheet. The task now passing to Bensoussan is to convert that stability into growth, broadening the customer base without reintroducing the complexity the business worked to shed.
His background points to the priorities. Nearly three decades spanning finance leadership and mergers and acquisitions at large consumer multinationals suggests a brief weighted toward disciplined capital allocation and commercial expansion rather than turnaround. Non-Executive Chair Stewart Gilliland said Bensoussan's international finance and commercial experience would be valuable as the group looks to broaden its customer reach while maintaining financial discipline, a message aimed at reassuring investors that the simplification of the past three years will be protected as the company pursues its next phase under Chief Executive Gerald Kuehr.
