Amazon elevates Doug Herrington to worldwide stores CEO

Amazon consumer executive Doug Herrington has been promoted to the newly created position of CEO of Worldwide Amazon Stores.

Seattle-based Amazon said Tuesday that, in the new post, Herrington will oversee the business formerly known as Amazon Consumer. Previously, he served as senior vice president of the North American Consumer business, a post he held for seven-and-a-half years.

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy announced Herrington’s appointment in a company message to employees.

“I’m excited to share that Doug Herrington will become the new CEO of our Worldwide Amazon Stores business,” Jassy stated in the message. “Doug has been at Amazon for 17 years. He joined the company in 2005 to build out our consumables business, launched AmazonFresh in 2007 and, in 2015, took on leading all of our North American Consumer business. Doug and I have worked together on S-team since 2011. He is a builder of great teams and brings substantial retail, grocery, demand generation, product development and Amazon experience to bear.”

Herrington joined Amazon in May 2005 as vice president of consumables and then was elevated to senior vice president of consumables in May 2014. Less than a year later, he was promoted again to the senior vice president of North American Consumer unit. Before coming to Amazon, Herrington was CEO of KeepMedia, vice president of marketing for online grocery pioneer Webvan and a partner at Booz Allen Hamilton.

Related:Amazon Fresh ramps up expansion with five new stores

“He’s also a terrific inventor for customers, thinks big, has thoughtful vision around how category management and ops can work well together, is a unifier, is highly curious, and an avid learner,” Jassy added about Herrington. “I think Doug will do great things for customers and employees alike, and I look forward to working with him in this leadership role.”

With Herrington’s appointment, Amazon said it’s also uniting its operations organization under John Felton (pictured left), senior vice president of global delivery services since July 2021. An 18-year Amazon veteran, Felton has spent 12 years in retail and operations finance leadership roles.

“In 2018, John moved to worldwide operations to become the VP of global customer fulfillment, and in 2019, he took over the newly formed Global Delivery Services group, encompassing global import/export, Amazon Logistics, and our last-mile delivery services,” Jassy stated. “He joined S-team in September 2020. John has strong end-to-end knowledge of our fulfillment network, operates with an important mix of strategic thinking and a command of the details that matter most in our network, is right a lot, and is a strong team builder who is dedicated to making Amazon a great place to work for our employees.”

Related:Amazon global consumer CEO Dave Clark to depart

Under the organizational update, Felton with report to Herrington, as will Russ Grandinetti (international stores), Christine Beauchamp (North America stores), Tony Hoggett (physical stores), Dave Treadwell (eCommerce Foundation), Neil Lindsay (pharmacy/AmazonCare/health care), Dharmesh Mehta (selling partner services), Peter Larsen (Buy with Prime) and Pat Bajari (chief economist).

“This is a very strong and experienced leadership team. I remain very optimistic about our Stores business and believe we’re still in the early days of what’s possible,” Jassy said in the company memo. “It’s worth remembering that Amazon currently only represents about 1% of the worldwide retail market segment share, and 85% of that worldwide market segment share still resides in physical stores. If you believe that equation will change over time (which I do), there’s a lot of potential for us as we continue to be laser-focused on providing the best customer experience (broadest selection, low prices, fast and convenient delivery) while working on our cost structure to have the right long-term business.”

One of Amazon's fast-growing stores businesses is Amazon Fresh, which now has more than twice the number of locations it had a year earlier.

Earlier this month, Amazon reported that Dave Clark, CEO of Worldwide Consumer, left the company to pursue other opportunities. A 23-year company veteran, Clark oversaw Amazon’s global consumer businesses, including online stores, brick-and-mortar stores, the third-party seller Amazon Marketplace and the Amazon Prime program.

For the full 2021 fiscal year, Amazon totaled net sales of $469.82 billion, up 21.7% from 2020. Online rose 12.5% year over year to $222.08 billion, while physical store sales edged up 3.4% to $21.76 billion. In the fiscal 2022 first quarter ended March 31, Amazon’s physical-store sales grew 17.1% (about 16% excluding FX) to $4.59 billion.

Brick-and-mortar sales at Amazon come mainly from the Whole Foods unit. Currently, Amazon’s U.S. physical stores include 515 Whole Foods Market specialty supermarkets, 33 Amazon Fresh grocery stores and 26 Amazon Go convenience stores.