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Agriculture 2025: WIGNER, PRESTON D.
CHAIRMAN, PRESIDENT AND CEO, UNIVERSAL CORP., RICHMOND
Virginia Business //September 2, 2025//
Agriculture 2025: WIGNER, PRESTON D.
CHAIRMAN, PRESIDENT AND CEO, UNIVERSAL CORP., RICHMOND
Virginia Business //September 2, 2025//
Wigner took the helm at Universal in October 2024, succeeding George C. Freeman, who retired after 16 years of running the world’s leading supplier of leaf tobacco.
Wigner, who joined Universal in 2003, was appointed the agriproducts company’s senior vice president in 2023, as part of a succession planning process. Previously, he’d served as the company’s vice president, general counsel and secretary.
For fiscal 2025, Universal Corp. reported $2.9 billion in revenue, a 7% increase over the previous year. “As we move into fiscal year 2026,” Wigner said in a late May statement, “we foresee continued strong demand for tobacco and larger tobacco crops shifting global markets to more balanced tobacco supply positions.”
In 2024, Universal completed a $30 million expansion of a Pennsylvania manufacturing campus of subsidiary Shank’s Extracts. The project added beverage-focused extraction and aseptic processing technology to the existing facilities.
Wigner has a degree in marketing from James Madison University and a law degree from the University of Richmond. Before joining Universal, Wigner was an associate at Williams Mullen law firm.
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