Adore Beauty boss quits to join IDP Education as its new CEO
The boss of online beauty retailer Adore Beauty has quit to join IDP Education and leaves behind her a company with a slumping share price and slowing sales growth.
Business
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The chief executive of struggling online retailer Adore Beauty, Tennealle O’Shannessy, who has been in the role for only two years, has tendered her resignation in order to join IDP Education as its new boss, leaving behind her a retailer whose shares are down 70 per cent this year and facing slowing sales growth.
After the market closed on Wednesday, Adore Beauty said that Ms O’Shannessy had resigned after accepting the position of chief executive of international educational services company IDP Education.
She was only appointed the boss of Adore Beauty in August 2020 in the lead up to its $270m sharemarket float in October that year, when the hyped-up private equity-backed IPO sold shares to the public at $6.75 each. But the stock has failed to trade above that price since and have fallen 73 per cent this year, and 80 per cent since its listing, with the shares on Wednesday closing down 6 cents at $1.36.
The online retailer, whose sales have been slowing following a shopping boom through Covid-19 lockdowns in 2020 and 2021, said Ms O’Shannessy will remain with Adore Beauty until February 2023, supporting the transition to a new CEO.
Adore Beauty chairman Marina Go thanked the outgoing CEO for her “outstanding leadership and contribution” during a particularly challenging couple of years.
“As CEO, Tennealle has done an excellent job delivering Adore Beauty’s financial and operational successes, including exceeding.”
In February, shares in Adore Beauty tanked to new lows when the retailer issued its first-half results that showed that first-half sales growth of 18 per cent had slowed to 14 per cent for the first six weeks of the second half.
In April a trading update reported that revenue had continued to splutter, slowing to 9 per cent for the third quarter.
At the time Ms O’Shannessy said Adore Beauty was reinvesting in the business by scaling initiatives that would lay the foundation for long-term growth and further strengthen its point of difference.
This would include the launch of Adore Beauty’s first private label products in the fourth quarter, but which will now be the responsibility of a new CEO.
Ms O’Shannessy has a strong background in the education sector that should serve her well when she joins IDP.
Prior to joining Adore Beauty she held a number of strategy-focused positions at SEEK, including the start-up and scale of Online Education Services, a public-private partnership between SEEK and Swinburne University. She also held multiple non-executive director positions for SEEK-owned assets. Previously she was a consultant with global tier-one management consulting firm, A.T. Kearney focusing on strategic and operational CEO-agenda issues.
Adore Beauty is slated to report its full-year results on August 29.
Originally published as Adore Beauty boss quits to join IDP Education as its new CEO
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