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Good morning! Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes’s conviction is upheld, TIAA president and CEO Thasunda Brown Duckett talks retirement insecurity, and women are key to growth at Levi Strauss.
– A ‘denim lifestyle.’ CEO Michelle Gass is months into her new strategy at Levi Strauss—but don’t call it a turnaround. “It’s not a turnaround, we have an incredibly strong foundation,” she tells my colleague Phil Wahba in his new feature story for Fortune.
Gass became CEO of Levi Strauss just over a year ago after a much-lauded handoff from her predecessor, Chip Bergh. Bergh is known for revitalizing the Levi’s brand, while Gass, the former CEO of Kohl’s, was tapped to turn it into a major retailer in its own right, not just a brand sold in others’ stores.
A key piece of that strategy? Women’s clothes. For most of its 172-year history, jeans for men were Levi’s “bread and butter,” Phil writes. In 2018, women accounted for 29% of Levi’s sales; now that stat is up to 36% and Gass has her eye on reaching 50%. To grow Levi’s from its current $6.4 billion business, Gass wants to tap women, who shop more often than men do. “We should be at least a $10 billion company,” Gass says. “That’s going to come through a few ways, but women’s [clothing] is going to be a key means to do that.”
Michelle Gass, president and CEO of Levi Strauss & Co., talks Beyoncé.Kristy Walker/Fortune Levi’s is expanding its assortment to include more tops, which shoppers also refresh more often than they do jeans. Levi’s very recently used to sell seven bottoms for every top; now that stat is two bottoms for each top sold. Its focus is still denim—but that includes clothes that pair well with denim, from western-inspired trends to Beyoncé and her hit “Levii’s Jeans.”
“We’re no longer just selling jeans, we’re selling a denim lifestyle,” Gass says often. Read Phil’s full story here.
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
The Most Powerful Women Daily newsletter is Fortune’s daily briefing for and about the women leading the business world. Today’s edition was curated by Nina Ajemian. Subscribe here.
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- Bad blood. A U.S. court denied Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes’s plea to overturn her conviction. Holmes is currently serving an 11-year sentence, convicted on four counts of defrauding investors in her defunct blood-testing tech company. Wall Street Journal
- Big insecurity. President and CEO of financial services and insurance provider TIAA Thasunda Brown Duckett thinks America needs to fix its retirement insecurity problem. One way to remedy this is making sure all Americans have access to annuities, as “income is the outcome.” New York Times
- Network shakeup. MSNBC president Rebecca Kutler is making changes to network programming. Joy Reid’s evening show The ReidOut has been cancelled and will be replaced with The Weekend cohosts. Also, former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki is taking a weekday primetime slot for Inside with Jen Psaki. CNN
- Do what you love. A new report from BCG shares findings from conversations with around a dozen female CFOs. A top finding—they love what they do. Fortune
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American Express Global Business Travel named Alisa Copeman CMO. Previously, she was SVP of global marketing for the group.
Earnest, a fintech company for students, named Emily Childers CMO. She was most recently head of growth marketing at Credit Karma.
Impossible Foods, a plant-based meat brand, named Meredith Madden chief demand officer. She was most recently CEO of The Kraft Heinz Not Company.
Law firm Gibson Dunn appointed Mellissa Campbell Duru as a partner in its securities regulation and corporate governance practice group. Most recently, she served as deputy director of the division of corporation finance, legal regulatory policy for the SEC.
Medical Group Management Association appointed Julia Rosen as SVP of IT. Most recently, Rosen was chief information officer of Pera Healthcare.
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“It also taught me a lot about power, because as young women on that show, we didn’t have any. Now, I look for opportunities to create more equitable power in any room.”
— Sophia Bush, actor and general partner at venture capital firm Union Heritage, on what she learned from One Tree Hill
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