Fashion apparel retailer Express, Inc. (EXPR) has appointed former Tyson Foods exec Stewart Glendinning as its new CEO following Tim Baxter’s resignation. In a statement, the company reported that Baxter stepping down is “unrelated to the company’s accounting or financial reporting,” which was released earlier this week and included a consolidated net sales decrease of 6%.
With more than 20 years of experience in the consumer products industry and “a proven record of operating excellence, financial discipline and building high-performance teams,” Glendinning will officially join the Express leadership team and board of directors on Sept. 15, 2023. Baxter will be on hand to ensure a smooth leadership transition.
Glendinning most recently served as Group President of Prepared Foods at Tyson Foods, where he managed all aspects of the Prepared Foods portfolio, including brands Jimmy Dean, Hillshire Farm and Ball Park. He guided the business to strong volume performance and market share gains across the retail brand portfolio. Prior to this role, he served as the company’s CFO and was responsible for worldwide financial planning, finance and accounting functions, and also has served at companies including Molson Coors, KPMG and the Hackett Group.
Despite the vast category change from prepared foods to apparel, Express Chairman of the Board Mylle Mangum reaffirmed the board’s collective confidence in Glendinning’s ability to “reinvigorate performance and build the strongest possible foundation on which Express can succeed,” in a statement. Mangum added that he will bring “fresh thinking to the Company and our strategies for profitable growth,” emphasizing the importance of “greater financial discipline” that drives “significant, sustainable shareholder value.”
The CEO shakeup comes less than a year after Express entered a “mutually transformative” partnership with WHP Global, which transformed Express into a multi-brand fashion retailer that includes Express, Bonobos and UpWest. Baxter noted during the Q2 2023 earnings call that this strategic partnership, and the broader transformation of EXPR, would help drive profitability and shareholder value while the company also focuses on “driving long-term profitable growth and delivering positive free cash flow in our core Express business,” and “leveraging our omnichannel platform to reduce costs.”
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