New CEO wants ‘more affordable’ Ikea Inter Ikea group, the world’s biggest furniture company, says its chief executive, Torbjörn Lööf, will step down after seven years at the helm and more than 30 years with the business. The current head of Ikea franchising, Jon Abrahamsson Ring, was named as Lööf’s successor. He will become group deputy chief executive on March 1 before taking full control of the business on September 1. Abrahamsson Ring joined Ikea in 1998, and was assistant to I
ssistant to Ikea founder Ingvar Kampred before coming deputy retail manager for Ikea China. Ring briefly left Ikea to become chief executive of fashion brand Filippa K and later gardening brand Plantagen, before returning to Ikea in 2017.
Abrahamsson Ring told Reuters that he didn’t have any plans to radically change the furniture chain’s direction, with Ikea’s key tenets of affordability, accessibility and sustainability remaining at the top of his agenda.
“I think we could broaden the product range a bit in our lower price range,” he said, adding that new materials, production techniques and distribution methods would help make IKEA “even more affordable”.
McDonald’s loses CMO
McDonald’s is on the hunt for a new chief marketing officer following the surprise resignation of Jenni Dill.
Dill has held the top marketing job for the past four years, replacing former CMO Mark Lollback, now the managing director of the media buying group, GroupM.
She currently sits on the Ad Standards board and the AANA board.
Prior to McDonald’s, Dill spent 25 years with PepsiCo, working her way up from segment marketing roles through to senior marketing director across both snacks and beverages in Australia and New Zealand.
Vale Wai Tang
Veteran retailer Wai Tang (pictured) passed away on February 16 after a short illness.
Tang had more than 30 years of experience in retail, a field she entered upon her graduation from university, working as a system and process consultant in the field of FMCG.
From 1999 to 2009, she was operations director of Just Group; in 2006 she was appointed CEO of Just Group’s sleepwear business Peter Alexander, a position she held concurrently; she is also a former GM of business development for underwear company Pacific Brands.
Tang left Just Group in June 2009 to start her own corporate advisory service, as well as a specialty retail concept in confectionery called Happy Lab.
In recent years she has been serving on several boards of directors, including since last August Metcash, where she was on the people and culture committee and the nomination committee.
She has been a non-executive director of JB Hi-Fi since 2015, where she was a member of remuneration committee and the audit and risk management committee.
She was also on the boards of Vicinity, Visit Victoria and the Melbourne International Arts Festival. According to the festival, she has provided advise to many prominent retailers such as Myer, Coles, the Sussan Group, General Pants Group, Pacific Brands, Yum Australia, Cosmetic Cubed, G-Star Raw and travel retailer AWPL.