Corporate Governance

The world’s leading beverage company is intensify efforts to generate high single digit earnings per share growth after strategies introduced earlier this year have been slow to take hold and third quarter earnings fell 13%.

Coca-Cola Company CEO Muhtar Kent unveiled a new slate of actions to reinvigorate growth and cut expenses in conjunction with the release of disappointing third quarter results. Revenues were essentially flat with the prior year at $12 billion during the quarter ended Sept. 26 while earnings per share declined 13% to 48 cents from 53 cents.

Plano, Texas -- Pretax restructuring charges related to corporate reorganization and store closures, as well as pretax impairment charges, helped reduce net earnings at Rent-A-Center Inc. 7% to $25.3 million in the third quarter of fiscal 2014 from $27.2 million in the third quarter of the prior year. Revenues grew 2% to $769.5 million from $754.8 million, and same-store sales rose 1.9%.

 

By Bruce Leonard and John Cumbelich  

A decade after founding Triad Retail Media, Greg Murtagh is stepping down as CEO of the digital retail media company to pursue new opportunities.

Stepping up to the CEO role is current president and COO Roger Berdusco who worked closely with Murtagh since the innovative agency was founded in 2004. Murtagh will remain on the company’s board of directors.

L'Oréal USA has announced plans to acquire multi-cultural beauty brand Carol's Daughter.

Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Created by Lisa Price in 1993, Carol's Daughter offers a range of products that are available at specialty beauty stores, mass retailers, on HSN, through e-commerce and at Carol's Daughter branded stores in New York City. For the 12 months ended Sept. 30, Carol's Daughter had net sales of $27 million.

Queens, N.Y. -- Airport retail developer MarketPlace Development is opening new shops, restaurants and services as part of an overall plan to upgrade the Food & Shops program at Terminal B in LaGuardia Airport as planning continues on a new terminal.

New York -- Retail design guru Rodney Fitch, 78, died on Oct. 20 at his home in Wiltshire, England, following a battle with cancer.    Fitch founded the design firm of the same name in 1972, and was appointed Commander of The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1990 for his ‘influence on the British Design Industry’.   He left Fitch, which is now owned by WPP, at the end of 2009.  

Michael Rayden, an innovative merchant credited with developing retail concepts that catered to the tween demographic, has announced plans to step down as president and CEO of Ascena’s Justice and Brothers division.

Rayden will leave the company at the end of January 15 following a lengthy career in the apparel industry. Ascena said it has begun a global search for a successor.