American Golf, the British golf retailer, has appointed Kevin Styles as new chief executive officer. Style succeeds Nick Wood, who had left American Golf to take up the same job at Pets at Home, in March.
The 40-year old Styles was most recently group chief executive of Habitat, the furniture retailer. He held this position for four months to elaborate a quick recovery plan for the business, which was later sold to Home Retail. Prior to that, Style was UK marketing director of electronics giant Best Buy, until March 2011, and an executive with Kingfisher-owned Trade Depot with a variety of top management functions, between 2006 and 2009. Earlier functions included board seats at Threshers, the off-license chain, and Thomas Cook.
His appointment was announced as the Warrington-based group published results for the year until the end of January 2012, showing a 25 percent increase in sales to £108.1 million (€135.3m-$167.8m), driven by store openings. American Golf opened four new stores in the fiscal year, and it bought and rebranded three others.
American Golf was bought at the end of last year by Sun European Partners, the private equity firm. On the back of this acquisition, the company plans to expand in the U.K. and continental Europe. American Golf, which already has 91 stores in the U.K. and the Republic of Ireland, is expected to open around eight new stores each year in the U.K. until it reaches a network of 140 stores, with openings focusing on the south-east.
American Golf wants to move into markets such as France, Germany and Sweden. Around 15 percent of the company's sales are generated by its online platforms, where about 30 percent of its sales stem from customers in continental Europe.
