Rachel Friend joins this week as head of consumer PR at the supermarket. She will lead the in-house press team, reporting to long-time director of comms Pip Wood.
Friend spent nine years at H&K. Latterly, she ran the agency's account teams for B&Q and Comet.
Her role at Sainsbury's was created as part of a restructure of its PR team. The food retailer currently has no plans to review its agency roster, which includes FD Consumer Dynamics.