Retail
J.Crew
J.Crew Group Inc. announced that its board of directors appointed Jan Singer to serve as CEO, effective Feb. 2.
Singer, a veteran consumer and retail executive with more than 25 years of experience, most recently served as CEO of Victoria’s Secret Lingerie. She will join the company’s board and assume responsibility for all aspects of the J.Crew and J.Crew Factory brands and businesses.
Michael J. Nicholson, who led the company as interim CEO, will return to his previous role as president and chief operating officer of J.Crew Group. Libby Wadle will continue as president and CEO of Madewell, reporting separately to the board.
At Victoria’s Secret, Singer led the company’s $4 billion intimates business across 1,000 stores and digital platforms. Prior to that, she was CEO of Spanx Inc.
J.Crew Group operates 184 J.Crew stores, 138 Madewell units, jcrew.com, jcrewfactory.com, madewell.com and 171 factory stores.
H&M
Stefan Persson will step down as chairman of the board of H&M Hennes & Mauritz AB in May and proposes that Karl-Johan Persson succeed him.
As a consequence, Karl-Johan Persson has decided to vacate the position of CEO and the company’s board of directors appointed chief operating officer Helena Helmersson as his successor.
Helmersson started at H&M in 1997 as an economist at H&M’s buying department and thereafter held various roles within buying and production. She was sustainability manager for five years and after that, production manager based in Hong Kong. For just more than a year, she has been chief operating officer.
Toms Shoes
Magnus Wedhammar, most recently a senior executive at footwear brand Sanuk, joined Toms Shoes as CEO, replacing Jim Alling.
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Magnus brings more than 25 years of experience in the footwear, apparel and accessories industry in the U.S. and European markets.
The CEO switch comes a month after Toms announced an agreement to cede control to creditors in exchange for a debt restructuring plan.
Alling, who was previously the chief operating officer of T-Mobile, was brought on as CEO of Toms after Bain Capital acquired a 50 percent stake in the company from founder Blake Mycoskie in 2014.
Foot Locker
Foot Locker Inc. announced that its board of directors elected Darlene Nicosia and Tristan Walker as directors of the company, effective Feb. 2.
Nicosia is currently president of the Canada Business Unit of The Coca-Cola Company. Walker is the founder and CEO of Walker & Company Brands, a consumer products company committed to designing personal care solutions for people of color that was acquired by Procter & Gamble in 2018.
Headquartered in New York City, the company operates approximately 3,160 athletic stores in 27 countries, as well as websites and mobile apps, under the brand names Foot Locker, Champs Sports, Eastbay, Kids Foot Locker, Footaction, Lady Foot Locker, Runners Point and Sidestep.
Brands
Columbia Sportswear
Columbia Sportswear Company announced that the company’s board of directors appointed president and CEO Tim Boyle as chairman of the board.
Boyle has been acting chairman since the passing of his mother, Gertrude Boyle, who was chairwoman, in November.
In connection with the election, the board also acted to formalize a lead independent director role on the board and appointed long-time serving member Andy Bryant to serve in the role. Bryant served as chairman of the board of Intel Corp. from May 2012 to this month, and, it has been announced, will be stepping down from Intel’s board.
Bryant has served on Columbia’s board since 2005, and chairs the company’s nominating and corporate governance committee.
Levi Strauss
Levi Strauss & Co. announced that it elected Yael Garten to its board of directors. With more than a decade of experience in data science, Garten directs Siri data science and engineering at Apple.
In 2010, Garten founded gNetics Systems Inc., a consulting firm where she advised companies on how to transform data into insights. She also spent more than five years at LinkedIn, where she led a team focused on online experimentation and analysis to generate user experience insights informing product strategy.
Founder Sport Group
Founder Sport Group, a manufacturer of stock and custom sublimated garments for team dealers, decorators and college bookstores, announced that Mike Seferyn has joined the company as chief information officer (CIO).
In this role, Seferyn will oversee all of the company’s technology initiatives, including digital customer-facing platforms and tools, backend infrastructure and systems, and information security.
Seferyn joins from Dollar Tree, where he was divisional CIO and led IT strategy, service delivery and project delivery for the Family Dollar brand.
Founder Sport Group features sportswear brands that include Badger Sport, Alleson Athletic, Garb Athletic and the Digital Apparel Lab.
Organizations
Delivering Good
Delivering Good, the charity for new product donations made by companies in the fashion, home and children’s industries, added four new industry leaders with diverse professional backgrounds to its board of directors.
Vince Adams, Stacy Berns, Todd Everett and Hebe Schecter will join the 32 other industry leaders on the nonprofit’s board and provide expert insights in key areas in support of the organization’s mission.
Adams is chief financial officer for Banana Republic, and will provide Delivering Good with insights into retail chains and strategic planning. Berns, founder and president of Berns Communications Group, will help Delivering Good share its story with a wider audience by providing communications expertise. Everett brings more than 20 years of C-level and executive leadership experience in supply chain, transportation and logistics at companies that include Intel Corporation, Newgistics and Pitney Bowes, while Schecter, CEO of Kaltex North America and president of Kaltex America, will provide valuable insights into the manufacture of apparel and home products.
Since Delivering Good was founded in 1985, more than $2 billion of donated product has been distributed through a network of community partners across the country.
World Federation of the Sporting Goods Industries
The World Federation of the Sporting Goods Industries (WFSGI) elected Motoi Oyama-san, chair, CEO and representative director of ASICS Corp., and James Zheng, executive director and president of Anta Sports Products China, to three-year terms as co-chairs at the organization’s general assembly in Munich on Wednesday.
They are taking over from Sean O’Hollaren, senior vice president of government and public affairs at Nike Inc. O’Hollaren remains on the WFSGI board as the immediate past chair and a representative for Americas.
Oyama and Zheng are automatically elected as members of the executive board and as representatives for Asia/Oceania.
Tom Cove, president and CEO of the Sports and Fitness Industry Association (SFIA), and Andy Rubin, chair of Pentland Brands Ltd., will continue as vice chairs for the Americas and Europe/Africa, respectively. Robbert de Kock remains the president and CEO of the WFSGI.
Logistics
FedEx
FedEx Corp. announced that Raj Subramaniam, the company’s president and chief operating officer, was elected to the board of directors. With his election, the board now has 13 members, including 11 independent directors.
Subramaniam oversees the strategic direction and execution of business priorities for the FedEx portfolio of operating companies, which includes more than 490,000 team members at FedEx Express, FedEx Ground, FedEx Freight, FedEx Services, FedEx Logistics and FedEx Office. He is also a member of the company’s five-person executive committee and serves as co-president and co-CEO of FedEx Services, which provides support functions for major FedEx business units.
Prior to assuming his role as president and chief operating officer of FedEx Corp., Subramaniam was president and CEO of FedEx Express.
STG Logistics
STG Logistics, a provider of specialty 3PL services to the global supply chain and a portfolio company of Wind Point Partners, announced that its board of directors appointed Paul Svindland as CEO.
Greg Muldoon, STG chairman and Interim CEO, will continue to serve as chairman.
Svindland has spent his entire 25-year career in the transportation and logistics industry as an executive, board member, operational leader and consultant. He most recently served as CEO of Celadon Group, one of North America’s largest asset-based truckload carriers.
Lenco Logistics
Kenco Logistics, a third-party logistics provider, announced the addition of Dan Coll as vice president of e-commerce fulfillment.
Coll will lead the expansion of Kenco’s e-commerce service offering, a strategic initiative designed to support the company’s rapid growth and diversification of its core offerings to align with the needs of today’s omnichannel supply chain customer. Kenco’s technology-enabled suite of supply chain solutions includes a network of more than 90 distribution facilities, end-to-end transportation services and an internal innovation lab, all of which will support the rapid expansion into the e-commerce supply chain.
Most recently, Coll led the strategy, execution and launch of FedEx Fulfillment. Prior to joining FedEx Supply Chain, he was the founder and president of Rapid Fulfillment, a supply chain company that delivered e-commerce fulfillment solutions.
Technology
Symphony RetailAI
Symphony RetailAI, a provider of AI-powered platforms and customer-centric solutions for merchandising, marketing and supply chain solutions, appointed Chris Koziol as CEO and a member of the company’s board of directors.
Dr. Pallab Chatterjee, who previously served as CEO, has retired after a long career in technology, including several years at Symphony Technology Group.
Koziol most recently served as president and CEO of Aspect Software, where he helped reposition the company as a $330 million, cloud-based software company. Koziol will join the board of Symphony RetailAI and Wadhwani will continue as chairman of Symphony RetailAI. Symphony serves more than 1,200 retail and consumer packaged goods companies worldwide.