Peter Swinburn
International Businessman & Arts Administrator

Peter Swinburn is currently Chairman of the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff. He joined the board of trustees of the Cardiff Bay arts venue in 2015 and became Chairman in November 2016. Prior to his post in Cardiff, he sat on the board of the Denver Center for Performing Arts.

Peter was previously, from 2008 to 2014, President and Chief Executive of Molson Coors Brewing Company, the world’s fifth largest brewer.

Peter was born in 1953 and lived in Mangoed, Penywaun, the son of Arthur and his wife Edna, née Silvey. He attended Hirwaun Junior Boys School prior to arriving at Aberdare Boys Grammar School in September 1964. However, his stay at the school was a very short one and he moved on to Howardian High School in Cardiff for virtually all of his secondary education. In his schooldays he was an accomplished player of both soccer and rugby. After leaving school, he attended UWIST in Cardiff and graduated in 1974 with an honours degree in economics. After graduation he married Janet Brixton, and the couple subsequently raised two children both born in South Wales, Jessie in 1978 and Rhys in 1982.

Initially Peter joined Bass in Cardiff and learned about the brewing industry from the bottom up. He worked his way through the management structure of the company and was appointed to the Board as Sales Director in 1994. Bass was taken over by the US company Coors in 2002 at which point Peter was appointed to run the international business at the company’s Denver headquarters. Then, in 2005 the Canadian brewer Molson, and Peter's company Coors underwent a merger, and at that time Peter returned to the UK to become President and CEO of Molson Coors Brewing Company with responsibility for operations in Europe and Asia. Finally, he returned to Denver in 2007 to run the American operations, and from mid-2008 he became overall President and CEO of Molson Coors Brewing.

He also served as chairman of Tradeteam, a logistics company jointly owned by Coors Brewers and DHL; and as a Director of Grolsch UK, a joint venture between Coors Brewers and Grolsch.

Mr. Swinburn has been a board member of the British Beer and Pub Association and industry chairman of The Portman Group, a U.K. trade organization promoting alcohol responsibility.

At the time of writing in 2011, the products of Molson Coors in the UK included Carling, Cobra, Coors Light, Worthington’s White Shield, Grolsch, Caffrey’s and many more. In the UK the company had breweries in Alton, Hampshire; Rock, Cornwall; Tadcaster, North Yorkshire, and Burton-on-Trent, Staffordshire.