Dive Brief:
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Satish Malhotra has resigned as The Container Store CEO “to pursue other opportunities, effective immediately,” according to an internal companywide email from board chair Joel Bines. Replacing him is an office of the chief executive officer responsible for operations and strategy.
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Bines, who will become executive chairman, is leading the office alongside Martin Schumacher, who has been the retailer’s chief transformation officer. Schumacher will become The Container Store’s chief commercial officer.
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Independent board member Mike Nicholson, who is J. Crew Group’s president and chief operating officer, will advise the OCEO. The company confirmed the details of the memo, which was viewed by Retail Dive, but declined to comment.
Dive Insight:
The Container Store has struggled for years and resorted to bankruptcy court at the end of December after an eleventh-hour $40 million investment from Beyond Inc. fell through. The retailer exited about a month later having shed nearly $88 million in debt — and, according to Bines, having gained strength.
“We believe in the future of The Container Store — the only national, multi-channel retailer dedicated to helping people improve their lives through the power of organization,” he said in the email. “The company emerged from its restructuring stronger and healthier, and we could not be more excited to help this incredible team recapture a dominant position and grow the loyal customer base.”
The retailer’s new leadership is operations-oriented, with Bines and Schumacher both having worked on distressed retail transformations at AlixPartners. Bines led the global retail practice there for nearly two decades, after about 10 years of operational roles, and wrote "The Metail Economy: 6 Strategies for Transforming Your Business to Thrive in the Me-Centric Consumer Revolution.”
For that book, Bines mined his experience in retail turnarounds, with an appreciation for how empowered consumers disrupted retail.
“We know change can create uncertainty, but the Board of Directors is confident that under the guidance of the OCEO, The Container Store has the right leadership in place and is positioned for stabilization and a return to growth,” he wrote in his memo to The Container Store’s employees.
