Dive Brief:
- Crocs has promoted Rupert Campbell to president of its struggling Heydude brand. Effective Monday, he joins the leadership team as executive vice president and reports to Crocs Inc. CEO Andrew Rees.
- Campbell arrived in March from Adidas, where he spent a decade in various leadership roles. At Heydude, where he has been senior vice president and chief commercial officer, he has overseen the brand’s global commercial strategy.
- In his new role, he will lead Heydude’s marketing and commercial go-to-market strategy, the company said. Since May, Rees had been serving as the brand’s interim president following Terence Reilly’s promotion to be the company’s chief brand officer.
Dive Insight:
Campbell is taking over at what could be a pivotal moment for Heydude.
The brand had a rough Q3: Sales plunged nearly 22% year over year to $160 million, with direct-to-consumer revenue mostly flat but wholesale plummeting more than 38%. Adjusted gross margin declined by 560 basis points to 42.3%, “driven by tariff headwinds and fixed cost to leverage, which was partially offset by higher [average selling price],” Chief Financial Officer Patraic Reagan told analysts last month.
That was ahead of expectations, though, and the report sounds worse than it is, given that much of the decline comes from a concerted effort to cut underperforming wholesale partnerships, according to Needham analyst Tom Nikic.
Still, “there's still a lot of work to do to turn around HeyDude,” Nikic said in an October client note.
On Monday, Crocs pointed to Campbell’s accomplishments at Adidas, where he served as the president of Adidas North America, “a market of more than $6 billion in revenue and a team of more than 10,000.” And he’s already been noticeably effective in his few months at Crocs’ secondary brand, according to a statement from Rees.
"Rupert has proven to be an instrumental part of the Heydude Leadership Team, driving global strategy and execution end-to-end across all parts of our Heydude business," he said.
