Herman Ossenblok has been appointed general manager of Sneakers and Cinderella, two Dutch footwear chains belonging to the same shareholders. Cinderella, a chain of 21 fashion footwear stores, was sold last year by the Bons family to Rikon Holding, which already owned Sneakers, a chain of 41 stores around the Netherlands and Germany, partly franchised. Robbert Bons, who headed up Cinderella, exited the company at the time of the take-over to be replaced by Jisse Waasdorp, chief executive for Sneakers and Cinderella. This was part of a reorganization implemented last year to partly merge the operations of the two retail banners. However, at the beginning of this year, Waasdorp relinquished his chief executive’s position to become financial manager of Sneakers. Ossenblok was previously a member of the executive team at Hema, a Dutch retailer specialising in home appliances. His objectives are to make better use of back office synergies between Sneakers and Cinderella, and to strengthen the positioning of the two banners.