Former PetSmart COO new chair of Body Central board

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Body Central Corp., a multichannel, specialty retailer that offers on-trend apparel and accessories at value prices, has appointed Donna R. Ecton as non-executive chairman of the board. Ecton has been a director of Body Central Corp. since May 2011.

Ecton is chairman and CEO of the management consulting firm EEI Inc., which she founded in 1998. She has been a member of the board of directors of CVR GP, the general partner of CVR Partners, a nitrogen fertilizer business, since March 2008. Ecton has served on a number of corporate boards, including H&R Block, Inc. from 1993 to 2007, and as a board member and COO of PetSmart. Ecton has also served as CEO of a number of companies, including Business Mail Express, Van Houten North America and Andes Candies Inc., prior to which she held senior management positions at Nutri/System, Inc. and Campbell Soup Company.

She was elected to and served on Harvard University's board of overseers. Ecton received a bachelor of arts in economics from Wellesley College and an MBA from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration. She has more than 40 years of business experience, including her experience in the retail and consumer sectors, and service as a director of several public companies where she has chaired three compensation committees, three audit committees and one finance committee, and served on two executive committees.

Ecton succeeds Jack Haley, who served as chairman of the board since July 2012, while the company was undergoing a transition period with a new senior executive team.

"The company wishes to express its gratitude to Mr. Haley for his leadership as chairman since last July, and we look forward to having Ms. Ecton as our new chairman," said CEO Brian Woolf.

Haley will continue to serve on the company’s board, which he has done since October 2010.

Body Central Corp. operates 281 specialty apparel stores in 26 states under the Body Central and Body Shop banners, as well as a direct business made up of a Body Central catalog and an e-commerce site.