A professional economist, enthusiastic with figures and a charismatic speaker, Valer Hancaş has over 21 years of experience in international retail companies.
Over the years, he has held various management positions in the Sales, Purchasing, or Marketing Departments. He is currently Communication and Corporate Affairs Director at Kaufland Romania. From this position, Valer coordinates all the external and internal communication, including CSR, sustainability and Public Affairs activity.
Since Kaufland’s strategy is to be actively involved in the community in the following directions: social issues, health, education, sport, environmental protection and support of Romanian producers, Valer Hancaş promotes internally and externally the CSR & projects and sustainability of the company, but not only.
Moreover, since July 2017, Valer Hancaș is the Vice President of the Global Compact Network Romania Steering Committee. He currently holds the position of vice president of the Association of Large Commercial Networks in Romania (AMRCR) and has been a member of the Economic and Social Council plenary session since January 2021. In 2024, he graduated from the master’s degree courses in Risk Groups and Social Support Services at the Faculty of Sociology and Social Assistance of the University of Bucharest.
Valer has been a key note speaker in numerous conferences, both national and international, captivating the audiences each time with his open, honest and humourous style. In 2023, he received the recognition of Communication Leader of the Year at the first edition of COMMA – Communication Awards.
As a true artizan of communication, Valer implemented successfully big communication campaigns which included PR, CSR and Sustainability for Kaufland. Let us just enumerate a few: the re-branding of Kaufland, the launch of the Kaufland Card app or the company private labels: K-Bio, K-Take and Veggie, the program „Romanian Shelf” – which promoted extensive presence of Romanian porc meat in supermarkets, part of the initiative to continuously support the local Romanian producers. Moreover, he lead the projects for wich Kaufland is recognized as a pioneer for sustainability in Romania: the first public electric cars charging network, the first sustainability report of the company, in 2017, using the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Standards, the first RVMs, waste collective infrastructure, the first retailer to collect empty hygiene and cleaning product bottles in Romania, the first regenerative farm and many more.
Maybe one of the bravest marketing and communication campaign led by Valer was the one which raised awareness and responsibility towards the exessive usage of plastic bags in Romania. Under the headline „Excessive plastic bags consumption is damaging to communities”, the campaign had an extraordinary impact, changing the behaviour of the Romanian population.