Estée Lauder’s North American region will be strengthened by two female executives, as President Mark Loomis is due to retire at the end of fiscal year 2025, after 28 years in the job. The outgoing CEO’s brick & mortar and digital activities will be divided between Tara Simon and Amber English respectively.
The announcement of the retirement of Mark Loomis, President of North America for the Estée Lauder Group, follows the retirement of Fabrizio Freda, CEO of the American cosmetics giant, and Travis T. Travis , CFO.
To replace Mark Loomis, not one but two profiles have been promoted, namely Tara Simon, as president of the North America region, and Amber English, as president of digital and online services for the said region.
Both will assume their new roles on January 1, 2025, to ensure a smooth transition, according to the Group’s press release. Tara Simon will report directly to Fabrizio Freda, President and CEO. Amber English, meanwhile, will report jointly to Fabrizio Freda and Gibu Thomas, Executive Vice President Online.
The departure of a visionary
“Mark is a visionary leader who has had a significant impact for nearly three decades within the company, promoting greater integration across our portfolio and regions, championing a commitment to our people and values, and inspiring excellence and creativity every day,” said Estée Lauder Group CEO Fabrizio Freda.
The CEO also expressed the Group’s gratitude to Mark Loomis for “his contribution and dedication”. He has guided business strategy in North America, maintaining a constant focus on the consumer in the midst of the changing beauty landscape,” he said. And in leading our Asia/Pacific region, he oversaw regional strategies that supported business acceleration and commercial operations to drive growth.”
For his part, Executive Chairman William P. Lauder praised Mark Loomis’s work in North America, despite “an extremely complex, competitive and rapidly changing environment”. He has guided the business strategy and innovation agenda across brands and channels for the region, focusing on exploiting emerging and granular opportunities. He will be sorely missed by the entire organization”.
Mark Loomis worked for The Estée Lauder Companies for 28 years, mainly in Asia-Pacific. He has headed the North America region since 2022.
He joined the group in 1996 as Vice President Marketing, Travel Retail Worldwide, for the Estée Lauder brand, and was responsible for developing and implementing global marketing strategies for the brand. In 1999, Mark Loomis was appointed Vice-President of Estée Lauder for Canada. In May 2001, he became Senior Vice President and General Manager of Estée Lauder International, overseeing the brand’s development in Europe, Asia-Pacific and Latin America. In 2018, he served as President of the Asia-Pacific region, a position he held for 4 years.
A new role for Tara Simon
In her new position, Tara Simon will focus on the execution of the company’s North American strategy for brick & mortar distribution channels, including specialty and multiple stores, department stores and independent stores.
From 2012 to 2019, she worked at leading US beauty retailer Ulta Beauty, primarily as Senior Vice President of Merchandising.
She joined The Estée Lauder Companies in 2020 as Senior Vice President (SVP) and General Manager for the Too Faced brand. She was then promoted to President of the global California Brands, a role which involved overseeing the Too Faced and Smashbox brands. Tara Simon focused on developing product innovation and customer engagement.
Tara Simon had held the position of President Worldwide for the Too Faced brand for 2 years.
Her successor as head of California Brands will be announced at a later date.
An Amazon defector
In her new role as President of Digital and Online Services for North America, Amber English will be responsible for accelerating the digital transformation of e-commerce and developing omnichannel capabilities for the region. She will be responsible for driving a strategy of customer acquisition and retention.
This is in addition to overseeing exceptional and differentiated brand experiences and all e-commerce activities in the North America region, including company-owned brand.com assets, retailer.com, and pure player retailers.
Six months ago, Amber English made her mark with the launch of the first Estée Lauder brands on Amazon Premium Beauty in the United States. She also led the group’s digital transformation in North America, developing unique digital customer experiences for Brand.com, Retailer.com and Amazon.
Amber English has played such a strategic role in the distribution of the group’s brands withAmazon, as the e-commerce platform was her previous employer prior to her arrival at The Estée Lauder Companies in 2022.
After arriving as Director of Amazon Fashion in April 2017, she was promoted to Director of Product Management and Talent Technology, a position she held for 2 years before being appointed Director Softlines, Private Brands. For this product segment, she was then responsible for all aspects of demand generation, pricing, product development, market, business development and customer experience.
The new tandem is expected to make a significant contribution to the Group’s sales, which fell by 2% to $15.6 billion in the 2023-24 financial year, despite a surge in sales of 8% to $871 million in the last quarter.
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Read also > Plummeted by its 2023-24 results, Estée Lauder will part ways with its historic CEO
Featured Photo: © The Estée Lauder Companies
