Kohl’s Three-Year CEO Curse CURED After New CEO Appointment (For Now At Least…)

So Kohl’s fired their ex-CEO after he dipped his proverbial pen in the company's ink… then they proceeded to appoint a new CEO with extensive experience at Victoria’s Secret? Sounds legit… 

After three consecutive years of clusterf*k leadership, Kohls has finally found their man in Michael Bender. The bar is on the floor, Michael. 

(Source: Giphy)

In short, Bender (who has previously held leadership roles at Victoria’s Secret, Walmart, and Eyemart Express) has been interim since May, which already tells you everything… no one else wanted this job. They still hired an external firm just so they could pretend this was a competitive process, but the reality is, the moment they fired Ashley Buchanan for trying to run side quests with a vendor he was dating, the board basically looked around the table and said, “Well… Mike’s here.” And now he gets to own the numbers. Not the good one though… the Kohl’s ones.

(Source: CNBC) 

For context, sales are expected to drop 5–6% for the year. They said that back in August like it was a weather report. The stock is still down 53% over five years, and that’s with the random meme-stock detour in July when Reddit tried to pump life into the corpse. Sometimes the market is compassionate. Sometimes it’s confused. Bender, to his credit, has done the only thing you can do in this situation: cut costs, close stores, tighten assortments, and pretend private-label apparel can fix macroeconomic reality. 

Which is why the turnaround plan  reads exactly like every turnaround plan for every legacy retailer that woke up too late: simplify the assortment, sharpen price points, “win back value-focused shoppers,” sprinkle some Sephora in the corner of the store and hope Gen Z suddenly forgets they have TikTok Shop. With that said though, the funniest part is that Kohl’s keeps insisting they’re “reestablishing leadership.” Leadership of what? Midwestern parking lots? Bender says the company has a “storied role in retail,” which is technically true the same way Sears technically existed for a hot second. 

(Source: Imglip)

And yet, what’s wild is that the stock has doubled since Michael Ben Dover took over (read: 100%+). Which means investors weren’t necessarily pricing in a turnaround… they were just pricing in a “please don’t make it worse.” And he… didn’t. That alone should be an accolade. For this reason, the board is committed, Bender is committed, and the market is cautiously optimistic… for now. And when I say for now, it’s because Kohl’s will announce earnings on Tuesday. Everyone will pretend to be shocked if sales are down again, even though that’s the entire business model at this point.

Meaning, keep your eyes on this hire and place your bets accordingly, friends. It could get interesting. Until next time, friends… 

At the time of publishing, Stocks.News does not hold positions in companies mentioned in the article.