Abercrombie & Fitch CEO’s turnaround playbook: Lead This Way premiere
Fran Horowitz took over the top job at Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF) in 2017, following a tumultuous stretch for the retailer. Under Horowitz’s leadership, Abercrombie & Fitch has undergone a revival, not only reclaiming its cultural relevance, but delivering profits for investors in the process.
While visiting the company’s new flagship store in New York City, Horowitz tells Yahoo Finance Executive Editor Brian Sozzi what it took to turn around the legacy retail brand. Horowitz describes the qualities that she says make her an effective leader, such as being authentic, having patience and admitting when she’s wrong.
“Make a mistake. And when you make a mistake, just fix it and move on,” Horowitz says.
Prior to leading Abercrombie & Fitch, Horowitz rose up the retail ranks at Express (EXPR), Loft, and Hollister, a brand owned by Abercrombie & Fitch.
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Video Transcript
BRIAN SOZZI: This is Fifth Avenue, the Mecca of retail, and here's Abercrombie & Fitch back in New York City.
FRAN HOROWITZ: Probably the proudest moment of my career. No one said it could be done.
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BRIAN SOZZI: So how do you become a successful turnaround CEO? You lead with compassion. You lead with hustle. You lead with empathy. You take all those terms together, and you get Abercrombie & Fitch CEO Fran Horowitz.
Going back to those early days, working in a retail store in high school, are there lessons you learned back then that set you up to do things like this?
FRAN HOROWITZ: The biggest impression in my career was at Bloomingdale's. I worked-- Mike Gould was CEO. Frank Doroff was my GMM. And they were the most authentic people-oriented managers. I, to this day, am fortunate to think that that's really where the best part of my career started because they taught me how to lead. And I lead now through authenticity.
BRIAN SOZZI: What is leading with authenticity mean?
FRAN HOROWITZ: It's going to sound kind of crazy, but you have to be you. And perhaps if that isn't what a person can give. But I leave it all out there. I mean, I'm just-- I'm very approachable. I'm very real. I go to the cafe every day and make sure I get coffee and chit chat with everybody while they're online.
Our meetings are very inclusive of all the levels in the organization. And those are, honestly, things that I learned really early on in my career and have taken with me all the way through.
And when we're at work, I admit when I'm wrong. And it's one of the funnest things I do with the team because I'll say, I'll challenge. I'll disagree. And then I'll say, when we come back to the follow-up meeting, I want to know if I was wrong, tell me I was wrong. And we've gotten to a place where they're very-- they will tell me. And that's great. And if I'm right, that's OK too sometimes.
BRIAN SOZZI: How do you deal with that-- how do you deal with that feedback when it's not positive?
FRAN HOROWITZ: You have to smile and take it just like as if it was positive. Then you have to say, OK, what was the lesson learned? What didn't I see? How come I didn't see it the way you saw it? What information did you have perhaps that I wasn't thinking about? And then it becomes a really great dialogue between you and the associate because you're really trying to probe and understand perhaps what you didn't see or vice versa, you know, what they didn't see.
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BRIAN SOZZI: What were your first big moves at the company?
FRAN HOROWITZ: When I shopped the mall way back in 2014, and I saw Abercrombie and Hollister, they were essentially the same brand with the same product with a different nameplate and a different price tag. And it was a precarious time. I mean, the brands were not loved. The business was in a downward spiral.
We went through a lot of starts and stops. But what we knew through the whole thing was there was an affinity and a love for the brand and consumer insights that kept telling us, keep going. You're going to get this and you're going to figure it out. And then pivoting the team and the company from telling the customer what they wanted to hearing what the customer wanted and providing that for them.
If you walk into our stores, and it was about presentation and how the store looked. You don't have to smell it six blocks down before you get to the store very candidly. Now, it's about how is the customer experience? What's important to the consumer? How are we making sure that we're pleasing them every time they shop with us?
BRIAN SOZZI: What is your turnaround playbook? Because driving turnaround for a brand that has had a lot of ups and downs since its founding-- what, 1892?
FRAN HOROWITZ: 1892.
BRIAN SOZZI: And that's not easy stuff.
FRAN HOROWITZ: No, it's not. There's a couple of lessons learned. So I went through this experience prior at Express. So I would say that turning that brought with me some good lessons. The number one lesson that I brought with me was patience and timing. And to think that you can do it all at once, you're going to burn out your team. And they're just-- they're not even going to be here to do it for you. So that was a big important lesson for me. So I feel like when I got to Abercrombie, I just knew I had to pace it differently.
I think building the team is also incredibly important because we had a lot of long-term associates. Many of whom are still with us. And we have new thinking. And bringing those two together is one of my proudest moments that I've built a team that actually has some of the original thinkers, as well as some new thinkers. And that brought together some incredible, incredible energy.
And lastly, make a mistake. And when you make the mistake, just fix it and move on. But if you wait until you think everything is perfect and ready to go, you're never-- you're going to stand still. You're not going to get anywhere. But I will tell you, the company was at quite an inflection point. And between the business, the profitability, and all the things that were swirling around, I mean, the first two years were extraordinarily challenging.
BRIAN SOZZI: Fran, looking back, what would you tell your former self?
FRAN HOROWITZ: You know, I think what's very important as you go through your career is to learn how to advocate for yourself. And that is-- it's not an easy thing to do because you have to balance between being humble and being proud of what you've accomplished. But I would tell you, as I've progressed and built confidence through my career, I've learned more and more that advocating for yourself is a very important thing to do.
If you believe that people know what you're doing and what you're succeeding in, you-- most times, not. And so that would be my best advice to give to someone, which would be to advocate for yourself.
BRIAN SOZZI: Lastly, I'll put the notes aside, Fran. What do you think will be your legacy in retail or in life?
FRAN HOROWITZ: I guess what I would hope for is that my legacy would be a leader that people really enjoyed working for, someone who brought them inspiration, happiness, taught them a lot along the way, had them take away good lessons from all of that. But I think leadership would be my most important thing that would make me the happiest.
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