Julia Brown, Burberry’s chief financial and chief operating officer, will be stepping down from her posts on 1 April 2024, the end of the financial year.
Brown’s departure from the brand is a result of her desire to pursue opportunities “outside of the luxury industry.” Burberry has already started looking for someone to take her place.
Not the Best Move for Burberry?
Her exit is not being taken well by industry experts. Burberry’s share price is already down by nearly 4% percent. “The CFO departure at this point seems like an outright setback,” Bernstein analyst Luca Sola wrote in a note to clients.
Brown joined Burberry back in 2017 and since has played a key role in the upward trajectory of the brand. She steered the brand through the pandemic when its sales had taken a major hit.
The fashion house also saw a 23 per cent increase in annual sales for the financial year 2022. This led to their annual sales of £2.83 billion, the brand reported in May.
The brand had, only 6 months back, welcomed a new CEO, Jonathan Akeroyd. Akeroyd had joined the fashion house in the middle of a multi-year attempt to rebrand Burberry as a leather goods luxury brand.
However, even after five years since this strategy was originally implemented by Marco Gobbetti, it has not been completed by the brand.
Speculations are also in the air that Akeroyd is looking to replace Riccardo Tisci, the chief creative officer, whose partnership with the brand is due to expire in 2024.
