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Executive Search for Succession Planning in Consumer Brands
By Lars Miller · Last updated: September 18, 2026
Succession search fills a seat you can see opening: a retiring COO, a founder moving to chair, a plant leader aging out. Protis Global runs retained succession searches for consumer brands at every level, analyst through board, on milestone installments you approve. Most transitions need 12 to 18 months of runway.
What a succession search covers
A succession search replaces a known departure on a planned timeline. The incumbent stays in the seat, helps define the role as it should exist next, and often screens candidates. Confidentiality holds until you decide otherwise. The work spans the C-suite, and it also covers operators: brewery managers, sourcing managers, national account leads.
The distinction from a replacement search matters, because the two run on different clocks.
| Dimension | Replacement search | Succession search |
|---|---|---|
| Trigger | The seat is already empty | The departure is known 12 to 18 months out |
| Incumbent's role | Gone, or leaving fast | Central: shapes the scorecard, screens finalists, leads the handoff |
| Confidentiality | Often public | Held tight until finalists are identified |
| Owner and family involvement | Immediate | Staged, usually once the slate narrows |
| Cost of the vacancy | Compounding daily | Avoidable, if the search starts on time |
When to start: 12 to 18 months before the seat opens
Start the search while the incumbent can still run the transition. In one search we are running now, a family-owned beverage distributor began its chief operating officer succession with the retirement 12 to 18 months away. The COO screens candidates himself, the slate narrows to a small group of finalists, and the owning family joins the process once those finalists are identified. That sequencing protects the business twice: the incumbent's judgment shapes the hire, and the organization hears about the change as a plan rather than a rumor.
We ran the same play on ourselves. Protis Global appointed co-presidents to lead the firm's next chapter while our founder stayed engaged, so we describe this process as participants, and as recruiters with 30+ years exclusively in consumer brands.
How Protis Global runs a succession search
Every succession search follows a staged process: a confidential intake against a written scorecard, sourcing from a network built only in consumer goods, a slate of talent you approve before interviews, and a standing weekly candidate review meeting until the handoff completes. Three team members work each search: a lead consultant, a recruiter, and a researcher.
A scorecard before a single call
The intake defines the role as it needs to exist after the transition, since the next leader rarely mirrors the current one. Must-haves and nice-to-haves go on paper, with the incumbent and the owners aligned before we approach anyone.
The incumbent stays central
Departing leaders carry the institutional knowledge a successor needs. We build the screening around them: they interview finalists, pressure-test operating philosophies, and plan the overlap period. Candidates take this seriously. In our interviews for senior brewery leadership, candidates raise succession planning on their own as the gap they most want to fix in the teams they inherit.
A slate you approve, installments you control
The second installment of our fee comes due when we present a slate of talent, in most searches two or three people, and you approve them to interview. The final installment comes due at placement. You have a say in when the second and third installments are paid. At other firms the calendar dictates milestone payments. Ours wait for your decisions, which matters most in succession work, where timelines stretch and boards deliberate.
A standing weekly review until the handoff
Every client gets a standing weekly candidate review meeting. Over a 12 to 18 month transition, that rhythm keeps the search honest: new candidates against the scorecard, interview debriefs while they are fresh, and a running read on how the finalists compare.
Family-owned brands carry the highest stakes
Cornell's Smith Family Business Initiative reports that about 40 percent of U.S. family businesses make it to a second generation, 13 percent to a third, and 3 percent to a fourth. Emotional attachment complicates handoffs, and family members often hold roles a successor must work around rather than replace. We structure these searches so the family sets direction at the start, steps back during sourcing, and returns for finalists. Founder-led, family-owned, and PE-backed consumer brands between $100 million and $1 billion in revenue make up most of our client base.
What a poorly run transition costs
Research published in Harvard Business Review estimates that poorly managed CEO and C-suite transitions destroy close to $1 trillion a year in market value among the S&P 1500, through failed external hires, lost intellectual capital, and underprepared internal successors. The per-company math is just as stark: Brad Smart, the researcher behind Topgrading, cites Chief Executive Magazine's estimate that a mis-hired CEO earning $1 million costs the business $27 million, roughly 27 times salary. Our guide to retained search ROI for consumer brand hires runs the numbers for seats below the C-suite.
Succession runs deeper than the corner office
Retained search at Protis Global covers every level: analysts, field sales team members, national account executives, retail execution managers, sourcing managers, directors, VPs, C-suite, and board. Succession thinking belongs at each of them. A brewery that loses its senior brewery manager without a bench loses output the same quarter, which is why intakes like our Mark Anthony Brewing work treat operator seats with the same rigor as executive ones. Across the firm we have made 3,000+ placements on 9,395+ first-round interviews, with 48 percent diverse placements and $754 million in client-credited economic impact. Building Companies. Changing Lives.®
If the seat you are watching is a first executive hire rather than a handoff, start with our guide to first C-suite hires for emerging consumer brands. For the selection process itself, see how to choose a retained search partner in 2026 and 7 things to know about retained search for CPG, or learn how our approach works.
Frequently asked questions
When should a consumer brand start a succession search?
Start 12 to 18 months before the planned departure. That window lets the incumbent shape the scorecard, screen finalists, and run a real overlap period. Waiting until the seat opens converts a planned succession into an emergency replacement search, with the vacancy costs that follow.
Does succession planning apply below the C-suite?
Yes. Consumer brands lose real output when operator seats turn over without a bench: brewery managers, sourcing managers, retail execution managers, national account executives. Protis Global runs retained succession searches at every level of the org chart, analyst through board, with the same three-person team and weekly review process.
How does Protis Global charge for a succession search?
Fees arrive in installments tied to milestones the client approves. The second installment comes due when the firm presents a slate of talent, typically two or three people, and the client approves them to interview. The final installment comes due at placement. The client has a say in when the second and third installments are paid.
How is a succession search different from a replacement search?
A succession search starts before the seat opens, keeps the incumbent central to screening and handoff, holds confidentiality until finalists are identified, and stages owner or family involvement. A replacement search starts after the departure, runs faster, and absorbs vacancy costs a succession search avoids.
