Bed Bath & Beyond taps new finance chief, head of stores and digital

Bed Bath & Beyond continues to bolster its leadership team with fresh faces under recently appointed Chief Executive Mark Tritton, who is working to turn the ailing business around. 

The company has tapped Gustavo Arnal as chief financial officer, effective May 4, CNBC has learned. Arnal joins the company from beauty conglomerate Avon, where he served as chief of finance. Current Bed Bath & Beyond CFO Robyn D’Elia is set to depart. 

It also has named Rafeh Masood as chief digital officer. Masood will join Bed Bath & Beyond on May 11, after leaving his role as chief digital officer at BJ’s Wholesale Club. 

Gregg Melnick has been tapped as its chief stores officer, also effective May 11. Previously, Melnick was the retailer’s chief digital operations officer. 

Lastly, Arlene Hong is set to become chief legal officer, effective May 18. She joins Bed Bath & Beyond from Fullbeauty Brands, where she held the same title. 

The company is expected to announce the slew of hires publicly later Thursday afternoon. 

Last December, Tritton, Target’s former chief merchant, essentially blew up his executive circle — ousting Bed Bath & Beyond’s chief merchandising officer, marketing officer, digital officer, its general counsel and chief administrative officer. 

In early March, it named former Walgreens’ Chief Merchandising Officer Joe Hartsig as its chief merchant, tasked with helping to reinvigorate some of Bed Bath & Beyond’s private labels. 

Tritton has said a large part of his strategy is focused on refreshing the retailer’s owned brands, remodeling stores and investing more in the beauty and baby categories — with its Harmon Face Values and Buybuy Baby banners. 

However, the coronavirus pandemic has forced temporary closures of thousands of retailers’ stores across the country, and has put much of Tritton’s turnaround plans on pause. 

When it reported quarterly earnings, the retailer said earlier this month that its results in 2020 will be “unfavorably impacted” by the Covid-19 crisis. It said it planned to cut back discretionary expenses like business travel and advertising, and costs related to the maintenance of stores sitting dark. 

In turn, Bed Bath & Beyond said it would be prioritizing roughly $250 million in essential expenditures in its digital business and rolling out more in-store pickup options. 

Tritton told CNBC in a video interview Thursday that the retailer has curbside pickup currently available for customers at 26 Bed Bath & Beyond locations in Texas, and another 26 in Florida. The CEO said it will roll that service out to another 100 locations over the weekend. The demand from customers using this option is up nearly 400{3c4481f38fc19dde56b7b1f4329b509c88239ba5565146922180ec5012de023f}, he said. 

“Based on my prior experiences at Target, I knew the value of BOPUS and order pickup,” Tritton added. 

Still, it remains unclear when Bed Bath & Beyond will reopen its doors to shoppers again. A number of retailers, including Macy’s, are planning to reopen dozens of locations as soon as Monday, as some shopping malls start to open their doors again, particularly in the Southeast, where lockdown restrictions have eased. 

“Opening our doors is our goal,” Tritton said. “But opening our doors in a new way.” 

The company has temporarily converted roughly 25{3c4481f38fc19dde56b7b1f4329b509c88239ba5565146922180ec5012de023f} of its Bed Bath & Beyond stores and Buybuy Baby locations into regional fulfillment centers, helping it fulfill online orders. 

Bed Bath & Beyond shares have fallen more than 63{3c4481f38fc19dde56b7b1f4329b509c88239ba5565146922180ec5012de023f} this year. The retailer has a market cap of about $792.2 million.