Internship Spotlight: Alyssa Mistretta, PepsiCo

Alyssa Mistretta is a Business Management major graduating in the Spring of 2022.  This summer she interned with PepsiCo as a Sales Management Intern in San Diego, California.

What was the process for getting this internship, job, or summer experience?

The process for getting this internship consisted of a online zoom interview and an application through one of the Eller internship job blasts.

What was a typical day like?

A typical day for me was out on the field and visiting a variety of customers and their stores. While at the stores, I was tasked with identifying opportunity within the store and retail activation. A big focus of mine was building relationships and credibility with PepsiCo's customers to ensure customer satisfaction.

What was your favorite part of the experience?

My favorite part of the experience was getting sales and driving results.

If you worked on a big project, please describe it below:

My focus was to grow volume, distribution, net revenue, and $MC through identifying selling opportunities and retail activation in assigned small format stores.

What did you find most challenging?

The most challenging part of my internship was building credibility with customers who were experiencing delivery and out of stock opportunity.

What did you learn?

During my internship I was able to strengthen my goal setting and analytical skills. I learned the importance of being consumer-centric and how PepsiCo operates by having the opportunity to shadow multiple positions within the company.

What advice do you have for other students looking for a similar experience, or advice for future students to be successful?

Advice I have for other students looking for a similar experience and to be successful is to ask as many questions as you need. Asking questions helped me understand different parts of the business in a beneficial way and helped me accomplish tasks that I was assigned to the best of my ability. Another piece of advice is to give everything you do 100% of your effort because customers and other employees will notice.

How did Eller prepare you for this experience?

Eller prepared me for this experience by teaching me how to present information out to a professional audience. BCOM is a crucial class that helped to excel from preparation of presentations as well as how to successfully work in a team environment.